


Wild Masters

by GothMoth



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: A New Fenton Appears, But Aren't Puns Kinda Needed For Danny PHantom?, Clockwork is a little shit, Fae & Fairies, Fuck Off Elmer, Gen, Ghost King Danny Fenton, I Know Most Are Agreed Flynn Is Danny's Cousin But Fuck That Still Doesn't Make Sense, Its Lets Give Vlad An Aneurism Time, Little Simple Nomad Gets Flung Into His Apparent Brothers Royal Bullshit, Look At Me Turning Flynn Into A Master, Misery Vex Will In Fact Show Up Eventually, Multi-Chapter Fic About A Brand New Character For A Long Cancelled Show?, Nomad Flynn Fenton, Puns & Word Play, Reunion, Timeline Shenanigans, Worldbuilding, danny's a little shit, it's more likely than you think, poor flynn, yes - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:27:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 37,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28171635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GothMoth/pseuds/GothMoth
Summary: Danny’s second little trip messing with the time stream had more consequences than he expected. As in the accidentally-creating-yet-another-family-member kind of consequence.Aka: B*tch went and gave Danny an impossible brother so I’m taking a piss on B*tch Fanon. While also making his head-canon make even an ounce of sense in canon.
Comments: 60
Kudos: 77





	1. Time-Related Hard Learned Lessons No. 2: The Set-Up

**Author's Note:**

> The Phandoms pretty well agreed that Flynn is Danny's cousin NOT brother, but fuck it Ill take the brother thing and make it actually feasible.

At first, and even still honestly, Danny was a bit confused as to why ClockWork even let him take a photo of his dad being all Vampire-looking half-ghost. But well...

“Hey guys! You idiots _actually_ feeling better?”, Danny rolls his eyes and throws them a smirk as he sits with his burger, “I wouldn’t put it past Vlad to have added an extra surprise to the ecto-acne crap”. 

Tucker chuckles, “honestly? Same. Almost sad it doesn’t seem like he did; been months and nothing”, pointing a fry at Danny before munching on it, “shame to waste such a good opportunity”. 

Sam rolls her eyes, “more like proof he was feeling bad”, raising an eyebrow, “does literally anyone think well when sick? And isn’t ecto-acne supposed to be basically deadly?”, glaring at Danny, “ _completely_ deadly, _not_ half deadly”. 

Danny snickers anyway before shrugging, “eh I think? Whatever, not our problem now”, and takes a few bites, stealing some of Tucker’s fries as well. Swallowing, “also, I totally used Clocky to figure out how to fix things”, chuckling, “might have overstepped and tried to de-ghost Vlad too”, shrugging exaggeratedly, “but eh, had to undo that. Kinda deleted myself outta existence at the same time. Sorta. In a way”. 

Sam promptly smacks him over the head with a scowl, “you idiot”, shaking her head, “considering they taught you a lesson by making you watch yourself basically murder multiple people including Valerie, fight your evil self, and think your family and friends were going to die in front of you; you’d think you _wouldn’t_ want them making you ‘learn things the hard way’ any more”. 

Danny waves her off, “hey, seeing Vlad and mom _married_ was punishment enough I think”. All three comically and exaggeratedly cringe at that, because yeah, ew and yikes. Major ew and yikes. Danny holds up a finger, “also”, and puts the little photograph on the table, “Jack Plasmius was a thing. Yeah...”. 

Sam just quirks an eyebrow and sips her kale shake while Tucker chuckles, “did he follow our VP is assaulting you too?”.

Danny looks down dejectedly, “yeah”, before straightening up, “but! He also believed and accepted me being his kid from an alternate timeline”, grinning, “so did mom, even if she did almost chop my arm off with a laser first”. Both his friends glare at him for that one and shake their heads. Danny just grins wider, “also, mom literally _asked_ me to make sure she _didn’t_ wind up with Vlad instead of dad”. 

Tucker immediately starts laughing, “wow! I almost feel bad for that bastard!”. Danny nods a little, because it was actually kind of sad. Vlad, even without ‘his life being ruined and Jack stealing his woman’ as the man liked to say, him and mom would have never worked out. Ever. 

Sam shakes her head with a chuckle, “so I guess you have proof they wouldn’t work out now. Will Vlad accept that? No”. Danny snorts at that, fiddles with the picture, and flips it over. Both of them go wide-eyed and scramble for the photo. 

Tucker blinking, “no way”, then laughing, “he almost looks not evil yet somehow way uglier”. 

Sam snorts and shakes her head, handing the photo back to Danny, “you know? You’d have better luck chasing Vlad away from your mom by showing him that fashion disaster that he apparently would wear if he hooked up with her”. 

Danny cringes, “not to mention my mom’s ‘fashion’”, shaking his head, “now enough about Vlad hooking up with my mom. Even if me having to see this photo is probably why Clocky even let me take a photo of dad as a halfa”. Tucker snickers at him but goes back to munching on his second burger. 

Sam shakes her head, “I doubt it’s that simple. This is ClockWork we’re talking about here”, glaring at Danny, “they always have more reasons than even you can shake a fist at”.

“Hey. I’m getting pretty good at duplication I’ll have you know”. 

Tucker snorts at that, “then why’d you have more hands than arms last time”, earning him a shove from Danny. 

* * *

ClockWork smiles faintly at the screen and shakes their head, Samatha was a smart girl though they would think there being other reasons would be obvious to their charge at this point. They would have also liked to think that said charge would have already gotten the message that messing with time was never a good idea unless it was them doing said messing, but apparently not. There was consequences for everything. Which really should have been clear to Daniel already, considering Jasmine revealing she knew about Daniel, and the Observants still having something of a bounty on Daniel’s head. The aftermath of Dan didn’t just go away. 

Sighing almost fondly and shaking their head, of course they personally _liked_ the aftermath. Hence why they made sure it happened. Having Daniel as their charge was something they were quite pleased with. The company was nice. But flipping to another screen, hopefully this time Daniel won’t forget that time meddling has consequences unless done right. And even then... well there’s a reason for their scar after all. Watching the man on screen, this time though, the lesson will be more ‘a Being, once created, exists regardless’ than ‘the best intentions and the purest hearts can bear the worst end results’.

Though their charge won’t be all that upset, more so confused and just a little disgusted. But not every lesson learned requires scaring the Hell out of the boy. Not that ClockWork didn’t enjoy doing that just a little. Scaring the Hell out of the Observants was far more entertaining. Too bad this only confused them rather than scared them. A brand new adult human cropping up in the Infinite Realm that didn’t exist before but has apparently been here for years? Yeah they were confused and frustrated. 

Smirking at the screen, and they were about to _have words_ with the High King about it. 

ClockWork doesn’t feel even slightly bad for their charge.

* * *

Danny sighs, feeling the cold mist on his lips, and rolls over in bed. Sitting up and rubbing his eyes, blatantly ignoring the Observant floating in his room with their arms crossed, and stretches out. Checking his phone and flipping through a few notifications. 

“Phantom”.

Checking his email and rolling his eyes at some clearly misspelled scam about some account or another needing him to renter his credit card. Could scammers at least try?

“ _Phantom_ ”.

Wonder what’s new at ass-o’ clock in the morning on Tumblr? Some idiot keeps making new things for their finished and over with tv show and it’s expectedly stupid? Alright cool, guess he knows what person he’s invisibly pranking today. Not like he has anything to do today and his parents are out at some convention. Hey maybe he might not even get bugged by any ghosts today? That was going _swimmingly_ so far. Ass-o’ clock and not a single ghost. Not a one. 

_“Your highness”._

Danny grins cheekily and looks at the Observant, “yes?”. Normally he doesn’t give much of a shit about royal titles, but it pisses off the eyeball assholes. That, and it’s fun making ghosties like Skulker and _Vlad_ have to call him king. Very _very_ fun and satisfying in Vlad’s case. 

If Observants could glare, they’d be glaring. “There’s been an... _unforeseen_ disturbance in the Infinite Realm-”.

Danny rolls his eyes, cutting in, “and your future sight failing you is my problem how?”, smirking, “what? Is Clocky rubbing it in your faces too much? And now you want to use their kid to mollify them?”, and snorts. 

This time, the Observant is definitely attempting at glaring, “a _human_ one”. Which makes Danny sigh and groan. Human problem kinda automatically meant Danny’s problem, even if it was minor. Ah the joys of being a halfa and thus still human and thus having more ‘place’ to interfere with human affairs.

Danny sighs again as he gets up and stretches some more, telekinetically floating over a shirt (he wore pants to bed, this crap was _exactly_ why). “G.I.W., my parents, Red, or something else?”. 

The Observant follows him as he wanders to the bathroom and he goes to ruffle up his hair in the mirror. “Something else. Something new”.

Danny sighs and rolls his eyes at the guy, “I get it, alright? Something unforeseen. Never before seen. I don’t care if you failing to see it bugs your stupid eyeball-shaped asses”. 

The Observant ignores the jab, “there’s a human wandering around the lands-”.

“Just one?”. Danny almost scowls, seriously? “You got me up at ass-o’ clock for one human?”. Granted that human might get themselves killed or some shit but come on. Unless that one human is part of his Mortal Realm lair this isn’t really his issue. Send freaking Cujo or even Wulf. Wulf would probably frighten whoever enough with his appearance alone that said human would never show their face in the Zone again. 

“He has apparently been wandering in the Infinite Realm for fourteen years but didn’t not exist until three months ago”.

Alright, that gives Danny pause. Because that is logically impossible. “So a three-month-old whose been there for fourteen years?”, sounding more than a little sarcastic, “yeah okay, that makes so much sense. You sure you lot aren’t hallucinating”. He knows they don’t just make shit up but hey, he’ll get his jabs in. 

The Observant gives a very dry, “obviously not”, before continuing, “he appears to be in his early twenties and is rather proficient in fight ghosts. We are certain he is not a hunter however”. 

Danny sighs, “wonderful”, before getting to work brushing his teeth. Looked like he was still reforming that tooth Technus knocked out with a telephone pole. Turning back to the Observant and putting his hands on his hips, “alright, where’s the impossible yet possible human?”. Not that he couldn’t just check and figure that out on his own, he just liked making the Observants work. _Especially_ when they were making him work. 

“He’s camped out at the Leviathan Whistler currently, roasting some yew dew berries and a couple blob ghosts”. 

That makes Danny blink. Well... ah... alright then. Guy eats ecto. As in will eat ghosts. Blob ghosts anyway. Which hey, ghosts ate them too. Even he did occasionally. Not like they didn’t just reform/respawn ten minutes later. No harm not foul. But wow, alright. He’s pretty sure a human eating ecto like that was a new one and totally not safe at all. Guy must have some built-up tolerance or something. Damn you know what? that’s actually kinda neat. Danny shakes his head, “how is that not dissolving his stomach. My folks would have a field day with that”, and chuckles, “alright alright, I’ll go check out our little nomadic ghost eater who shouldn’t exist”, finger-gunning, “ten bucks Clocky knows what’s up though”. Not that Danny’s gonna bug the guy for answers, he’s gonna leave them alone after the mess he almost certainly caused them with his most recent screwing around with time. Plus, they’d probably just riddle him as a form of mild payback. 

The Observant ignores that last comment, “see to it that you do”, and goes to phase through the ceiling. Danny grabs their tail to stop them though, making a point to sound threatening, “was that an order”; no one got to order the High Ghost King and he will always gladly call the Observants out on that. Even if that totally wasn’t actually an order even in the slightest. 

The Observant pales, “no, your highness”. Danny grins meanly, “good”, and let’s go; quite content with frightening the guy some. The Observant promptly leaves, probably not wanting to stick around for Danny to change his mind and destroy them or something for the slight. Not that Danny actually would but, out of all the ghosts, they were most likely to believe he’d destroy them or some other ghost. Since the eyeball assholes were still convinced he’d become Dan even if that would _never fucking happen._

Sighing, Danny shakes his head before heading downstairs. Grabbing a quick snack before heading down to the lab and off through the basement portal. Yes he could just make his own, but did he really feel like putting in that much effort? Nope. 

Sending a quick text to the trio group chat that he’s stuck doing royal crap so, like, don’t wait up. 


	2. A Master In Time, But Only By Half

It takes Danny half an hour to get to the Leviathan Whistler, he took the scenic route purely to piss off the Observants some more. Sticking his head invisibly over the top of one of the rock crags and yup, one lone random human dude. Twenty-something at best and looking to be cleaning up his -definitely self-made- cooking supplies. Guy kinda looked like Hell. Danny’s nomad comment was probably more on point than he meant for it to be. Guys clothing wouldn’t look all that out of place in Ancient Rome, Danny’s pretty sure they guy just wove a blanket with a neck hole out of ox-flax linen, a waist rope out of thick vines, and was he wearing a Minotaur pelt over his shoulders like a shawl? Alright points there, guy could clearly fight if he managed to pull off ‘killing’ and skinning a Minotaur. Ancients. 

He’s got what looks like another rope belt laying on the group off to the side with jars and pouches, made out of more hide, tied to the side. Danny’s pretty sure one of the jars is filled with water and a decent population of SignalShines; makes sense, those tiny ghosts were stellar for cleaning wounds or infections. He’d bet money on the pouches being filled with herbs or other handy things. He also absolutely notices the crude knife craved from ecto-ice with more -likely self-woven- fabric wrapped around the hilt; which honestly just impresses Danny, ecto-ice was hard as shit to carve. There’s also a staff/spear in the corner. Looked like the shaft was Elser wood, sturdy stuff. The solidified ecto-energy on the end looks suitably sharp, that would burn the guy's skin like Hell if he touched it though. The tied on phoenix feathers were a nice touch, especially if the guy knew how to use the ecto-fire literally anything Phoenix was infused with. 

Looking back to the guy himself, Danny can easily see the scars littering his arms and legs, though he had what was effectively bark armour tied with fabric over his forearms and shins. Danny doubts that was exactly comfortable but hey, all the power to the guy. Better than bare arms and legs at least. He also had fabric tied around his hands and arches of his feet, which yeah was smart. Guy probably punched things and clearly didn’t have shoes. Danny imagines making shoes was probably stupid difficult and bare toes and fingers had better grip. Dude must have calluses for days though. Danny doubts the guy actually cares. Especially considering his scruffy appearance. He had a bit of rough facial hair, probably did actually shave since a beard would get in the way. Even if he left his hair a long orange matted mess. Eh, was probably harder to trim hair with self-made tolls. You can’t see the back of you head after all. The guy's face though, was weirdly familiar. The strong jawline, sharp eyebrows, and pale skin; the hair being tied back with a chunk of fabric didn’t help. Add in him being skinny yet packed with lean muscle. Dude looked way too much like Vlad and Danny himself actually. He might be blaming the guys faintly glowing green eyes -he’s definitely been here a while to build up enough ecto safely to make his eyes glow- for Danny thinking he looks kinda like him though. And fine, literally any guy wearing their hair in a low ponytail reminded him of Vlad. 

Danny gets jerked out of his analysing when the guy squints up at the air, looking slightly tense, “I know yer there. Who are ya an want do ya want?”. 

Danny blinks, alright how the Hell. Deciding to stay invisible for now, “well you're an aware one. How’d you know?”. 

The guy scoffs, “I’ve been ‘round long enough to know a ghost when I feel one”. 

Danny nods to himself, alright the guy could effectively sense ghosts. Probably could pick up on their ecto-field/glow when they got close enough. That kind of thing wasn’t nearly as good as Danny’s ghost sense but practically half of Amity could do the same. “Alright, fair play to you. How long is ‘long’ though?”. The guy squints at the air, clearly mistrustful which fine, is fair. And this is a human, a human that _isn’t_ going all ghost murder happy at the mere presence of a ghost. So eh, little trust for trust. Danny pops himself into visibility, waves down at the guy when he spots him, “hiya”, and floats over the top of the rock to sit down on the ground. Danny’s still going to forgo his Kingswear for now though. 

The guy huffs, “yer a small one, ain’t ya”, but clearly doesn’t think Danny is any less a threat for him only being five foot four -almost five now!. Danny snorts but rolls his hand for the guy to keep speaking. The guy squints some more but acquiesces, “can’t say I know, shorty. Ain’t easy to tell time ‘er”. Danny thinks ClockWork is probably snickering at that comment a little (they were). 

Danny chuckles mostly to himself, crossing his legs and putting an elbow on his knee, chin in palm, “true. Though ah, your ‘long’ isn’t very long. You’ve been here, like, three months. You kinda just appeared outta nowhere”, sighing dramatically, “your appearance confused some annoying ghosts”, sighing again, “who then came to annoy me to go annoy you to figure out what the bloody shit is going on”. 

The guy looks more than a little confused, still guarded but it’s a confused guarded, “an why would these ‘annoyin’ ghosts’ know how long I’ve been”. 

Danny shrugs, “omniscience. Kinda. They can see all the present and the most likely future”. Danny’s giving the guy points for only blinking at that. Must be pretty used to the ghost powers being wild and crazy then. “Clearly you’re familiar with the Infinite Realm and ghosts though, so clearly it has _not_ been just three months”, huffing self-deprecatingly, “even I’m not that stupid even on a bad day to think a random guy carved a chunk of ecto-ice into a knife and got a Minotaur pelt in the span of three months”, chuckling, “that would be stupid impressive though”. 

The guy grunts, “been ‘er since I was ten”. 

“Uh, that’s something but not that helpful. Got a year to go with that age, buddy? Or a birthday maybe?”, screwing up his face, “on that note, how the heck did you even get here. When you were ten anyways, doubt you know how the three months ago thingy happened”. 

The guy shakes his head, “can’t say I do. Fer when I was young tho, my ma and pa made a portal ‘er”. Danny finds that a fair bit concerning. “Misery Vex nabbed me in”, huffing, “an little me ain’t ‘bout to stick ‘round to see what the half spider was gonin’ ta do”. 

Danny chuckles a little, “yeah I don’t think any ten-year-old would stick around that. First time I wound up here I ran smack dab into a guy with a skeleton face that was, like, sixty feet tall. Noped the fuck out real quick”, shaking his head and squinting, “no clue who Misery Vex is, which is a feat ‘cause I know most ghosts. Especially one that messes with humans. Though why didn’t you just, you know, go back through the portal?”. 

The guy shrugs, “Vex destroyed it”. 

“Huh”. Well at least Danny doesn’t have to worry about that. Maybe. Hopefully. 

“An I was born in nineteen-eighty-three. April first”, the guy squints, “an why do ya know erryone”. 

Danny rubs his neck, “ah well, I basically protect the Mortal Realm from dangerous ghosts”. The guy looks slightly less tense at hearing that. Probably has decided Danny’s not really a threat now, or at least less of a threat. Danny nods a little, “and you’re twenty-four then”, humming to himself, “fourteen years then. How in the name of all the Ancients does fourteen years turn into three months?”. Then pinching his nose, “timeline tomfuckery, goddamnit”. 

The guy glares, “explain. Since ya clearly figured things out yerself”. 

Danny sighs and lays on the ground, putting an arm over his eyes, “alright so hear me out. Time travel is a real legit thing. There’s also, like, multiple timelines and shit. So I’m guessing that’s option one and option two”. 

The guy nods, seeming way too chill about finding out time travel’s a thing and that he’s likely from a different time or timeline. “Maybe. ‘Er doesn’t change so I ain’t likely ta notice the difference”. 

Danny nods, “true”. Speaking back up when the silence gets awkward, “anyway, you got a name? Calling you ‘the guy’ in my head is getting old”.

That gets a laugh out of the guy. “Flynn”, pointing at Danny, “an ya? Seem friendly enough”. 

Danny chuckles, “glad you approve. I’m Danny. Danny Phantom”, And watches for a reaction. If Flynn here got yoinked into the future (then somehow got sent back to the past/here and now) when this ‘Misery Vex’ pulled him through then he should have heard of Phantom. Would also explain Danny not knowing this Misery Vex ghost. 

Flynn squints his eyes a little, “ya say that like I should know it”. 

Danny furrows his brows, “everyone and their plants knows me, so yeah. Do you know of Pariah Dark?”. Maybe Flynn got yoinked ridiculously far into the past instead? Like before all the current Observants were around kind of far. 

Flynn nods immediately, “heard of ‘im. Sealed in some coffin”. 

Alright, not thrown super far in the past. “Whelp, that all but eliminates option one. So congrats you’re probably from an alternate timeline”, tilting his head, “one without me”. Squinting, “hey... do you know if your folks ever claimed their portal was the first one?”. Danny’s got a feeling and he doesn’t like it.

“Ma said, yah”, Flynn shrugs, “Pa said it ain’t. Said the ‘college’ one counted”. He clearly doesn’t know what the heck ‘college’ is. 

Danny blinks before jerking up straight, “wait what? College? Like they... built one in college?”. Dude better say no to that. Fuck.

Flynn squints at him and nods, “blew up tho”. Danny groans very loudly and puts his head in his hands. Flynn scrapping some gunk off one of his cooking sticks, “ya figured another thing?”. 

Danny groans again, “do you remember any names? Your folks?”. 

Flynn sighs and is clearly rather unhappy, “no. Been while. Don’ know if I ever knew”. 

Danny cringes, poor guy but he can’t really feel bad right now considering the mild mental crises. “Ah sorry man”.

“Is what it is. Past’s best left there. Ain’t like I’m gonna see ‘em ‘gain”. Danny’s surprised and kinda sad over how Flynn doesn’t seem genuinely bothered by that. “My time’s better spent on survivin’”. 

Danny glances around, “seem pretty good at that too”. Moving to dig in his pocket, pockets that just kinda magically appear whenever he wants or needs them somehow, and digs out that photo; seriously hoping he’s wrong because what the fuck. Fingering the photo before leaning over and holding it out to Flynn, “recognise either of them?”. 

Flynn blinks and goes wide-eyed, practically snatching the photo, “that’s ‘em. That’s ‘em”, looking back to Danny seeming almost excited, “that’s ‘em”, looking back to the photo and bringing it close to his face like he’s trying to soak up every detail. Flipping it over and furrowing his brows, giving Danny a really weird look before going back to thumbing the other side. 

Danny massages his temples. This is bullshit. Fuck you ClockWork. Oh Ancients. Danny groaning and only feeling a little like an utter asshole for interrupting Flynn freaking out over basically seeing his parent (parents? Hopefully not but knowing Danny’s luck...) for the first time in a freaking decade. “Both of them? Or just one?”. 

Flynn sounds rather distracted, understandable. “I said it’s ‘em. Both of ‘em”. Fuck Danny’s entire existence. 

Danny sighs, “do you... like your dad?”. 

Flynn gives him a really weird look, “don' remember ‘im well, stuck up and real proper-like but he’s pa. Course I like ‘im. Ma _was_ better tho, real sweet”, then goes right back to the photo, “made great cookies”. 

Danny manages to chuckle weakly at that, “yeah she does. When they don’t accidentally come to life anyway”. That gets Flynn to look at him again, “how ya know ‘bout that?”. 

Danny rubs his hand down his entire face, “‘cause man, ‘cause she’s _my_ mom”, groaning to himself, “Ancients fuck, I have a _half-brother_. What even is my life?”. 

“ _What_?”. This time Flynn sounds genuinely utterly baffled. Reasonable. 

Danny groans again but goes about digging in his magic pocket again, pulling out his wallet and pulling out a family photo from that. Handing it over to Flynn, who takes it and eyes it cautiously and clearly still baffled. Looking even more baffled down at the image of Maddie, Jack, Jazz, and Danny. 

“What”.

Danny grumbles incoherently and sighs, “okay first, you’re from an alternate timeline for sure”, Danny gets up and walks to sit himself next to Flynn, who watches him cautiously and slightly freaked. Danny leaning over, pointedly ignoring Flynn moving away slightly to avoid contact with Danny’s ecto-field, pointing at the photo with his own family, “Maddie, mom. Jack, dad. My sister, Jazz. And me, obviously”, rubbing his neck, “well human living me anyway”.

Flynn stares at the photo a little, “then... I’m from a timeline where ma ended up with my pa not yer pa”. 

Danny shrugs awkwardly, “guess so”, rubbing his neck and looking around, “uh, my- _our_ I guess, mom and _my_ dad made a portal in this timeline”. 

Flynn chuckles faintly, “ya were pulled instead of me then”. Which Danny shakes his head over immediately, “naw, that would have been a lot simpler”, sighing, “I’m guessing you were just near the portal when it activated. Well... I was _in it_ ”, shrugging and gesturing over himself, “hence the dead/ghost thing”.

Flynn shakes his head, “least ya remember ‘em. Most ghosts don’”. 

Danny chuckles awkwardly, “true”, then thinking on it, Flynn basically lived here in the Zone, halfas were common knowledge. “Question, you heard about halfas?”. 

Flynn gives him a weird look, “heard it, yah. Don’ know it tho”, looking back to the photos, “rather know ‘bout my pa”. 

Danny rubs his neck, “ah. Yeah I guess that makes sense. Don’t have a this-timeline-photo of him, sorry man”, smiling, “I do know him though, he’s my godfather actually”, sighing, “the halfa thing kinda needs to be explained though”. Grabbing the other-timeline-photo and flipping it over. Tapping the image of halfa Jack, “that’s Jack by the way”. 

“Yer pa’s a ghost?”. 

Danny chuckles at that, “no. Well, not in _this_ timeline”, shaking his head, “that college portal in your timeline blew up in my dad’s face, Jack. In this timeline it blew up in Vlad’s face. The proto-portal blowing up caused ecto-acne, hospitalising whichever person it blew up on for years and turned whoever into a halfa over time”. 

Flynn looks over the photos, “then my pa’s a ‘halfa’ ‘er? And ma’s with the one that ain’t a ‘halfa’”, huffing, “what’s ‘halfa’?”. 

Danny nods curtly, “half a ghost, half a human. Living yet dead”, shaking his head, “both our dads had a thing for mom, basically whoever didn’t wind up in the hospital made their move”, he tries not to feel creeped out about Vlad making any kind of ‘move’, “my folks don’t know about halfas by the way. In _either_ timeline”, tilting his head, “well okay. Jack doesn’t know here, Vlad doesn’t know in yours”, chuckling, “be pretty fucking if Vlad here or Jack in your time didn’t know about halfas”. 

Flynn laughs slightly at that and nods, looking at the rock ‘ceiling’ of the cliff they’re under, “yah”, looking back to Danny, “half-brothers then?”. 

Danny nods, rubs his neck, and chuckles, “yup. As of three months ago we both have magicked a sibling”, shaking his head, “and it’s totally my fault since I, uh, kinda accidentally created your timeline via trying to undo Vlad’s accident via time travel”. 

Flynn squints at him, “why would ya even do that. Moron”, huffing, “I like existing, tho been rough”.

Danny nods, “no worries I’m not going to try undoing you, I’m not a douche bag. Even if I already have one overbearing older sibling and Vlad having a kid with my mom is major ew”, grimacing, “and I’m not sure I want to even tell the guy”. 

Flynn glares at him, “if it is possible to see my ma and pa, I want to see ‘em. Ya findin’ it gross or not”, huffing, “got somethin’ ‘gainst my pa er somethin’”. 

Danny chuckles awkwardly and leans away from him a little, earning more glaring, “well you see... Vlad kind went bat shit insane. Guy’s done pretty much every bad thing in the book. Bank robberies to murder”, rubbing his neck, “kinda why I asked if you liked him. In this timeline, he’s a really bad guy. One of his goals is literally to forcibly marry mom, murder dad-Jack, and force me to be his apprentice slash son. He literally just attempted to murder my two best friends. Also tried to kill Jazz. And realised Pariah Dark, causing a mild war. Release Vortex, almost destroying the world. Summoned UnderGrowth, almost destroying the world”, giving Flynn a kinda sympathetic pitying look, “Vlad is whole-ass evil”, sighing, “though sometimes I do wonder if he could be helped. Kinda why I tried to undo his accident. Figured that would stop him from falling out of contact with my folks which is sorta what caused him to go nuts. He’s always been kinda a bad guy though, even in your timeline he was kinda a controlling manipulative dick. And mom personally asked me in that timeline to make sure she _did not_ end up with Vlad. Sorry man”. 

Flynn blinks, “there’s a lot there”, looking back to the ceiling, “in a way, I’m not surprised. Stuck up, I said. Could see ‘im bein’ possessive and controllin’”. 

Danny nods, “yeah, doesn’t help that his Obsession is literally possession”. Flynn actually cringes at that, obviously getting it. Danny rubs his neck, “and guess I should be honest, not like you won’t hear it from the ghosts eventually. But I’m a halfa too”. 

Flynn nods, still looking at the ceiling, “I’m ain’t”. 

Danny snorts, “obviously. But like I said, folks don’t know about halfas. So obviously they don’t know I’m anything other than a sixteen-year-old human teen that doesn’t do as good in school as they’d like or do chorus very often. And doesn’t agree with them about ghosts being ‘evil ectoplasmic manifestations of post-human consciousness’ that need to be ‘annihilated out of the human world’”. 

Flynn looks down at him, “that... is extreme. And wrong”. 

Danny shrugs, “most humans aren’t exactly knowledgeable about ghosts”, shrugging, “they’d be cool with the halfa thing though, if they knew”, poking Flynn, who gives him a weird look for that. Guy probably wasn’t much for physical contact, especially with ghosts. Half ghost or not. “I actually told my folks in your timeline funny enough. They accepted me in a heartbeat, even if my dad tried to beat me up first and called my name stupid, and mom tried to laser beam my arm off”. 

Flynn blinks at him, “I think I have grown up safer ‘er than ya have with ma and yer pa”. 

Danny snorts, “half-ghost plus living with ghost hunters isn’t the safest”, shrugging, “family’s family tho”. 

Flynn glares slightly, “an my pa’s family”. 

Danny groans, “guess you still want to meet him, huh? I’m not calling the frootloop my family though, giving me a half-brother in another timeline or not”. Sighing at Flynn’s nod, “just don’t let the nutcase manipulate you. Manipulation is kinda one of his things. Also, literally the first time I met him he trapped me in a box and tried to kill my dad. So don’t expect said meeting to be boring”, chuckling and standing up, “I can kick his ass though, if you need that. We beat each other up a lot”. Flynn follows him in standing up, brushing off his legs. “Also, Vlad was a bit wealthy in your timeline, but in this one, he’s the third richest person in the world. And a lot of the meaner ghosts, like Skulker, work for him. At least sometimes anyway”. 

Flynn huffs, “I can defend myself fine. From ghosts er people er both”. Danny watches the guy go about tying on his waist belt with the pouches and knife, and grabbing his staff; he’s not about to deny Flynn can obviously fight. Fight ghosts at that. 

Danny eyes the staff, “yeah well, I doubt you've ever fought a halfa. We’re tougher than full ghosts and not everything that affects ghosts affects us or all the time”, smirking a bit smugly, “I guarantee you couldn’t beat me”.

Flynn grunts, “ego”.

Danny just gives a very smug, “fact”, then glances out towards the Zone at large, “how have you even been getting around this place? You can’t exactly float”. 

Flynn grins almost meanly, fiddling with his Minotaur hide resulting in a bunch of Phoenix feathers dropping down like a cloak almost. Danny watching the guy walk over to the ledge and jump off, the feathered cloak spreading out like a glider. Well damn, that was genius. He’s so going to have to talk his apparent sibling into making Sam and Tuck one. They can’t always steal the Speeder after all. 

Danny shakes his head and flies off after him. 


	3. In Royal Greetings

Danny flies under Flynn for a while, pretty well marvelling at the guy's ingenuity; which Flynn is clearly smirking faintly over. 

Danny floats closer to him and speaks up after a bit, “guess I should probably explain a few more things to you, being siblings and all. Especially since you actually want to know mom and Vlad, probably my dad too”. 

Flynn dips to the side a little, “go ‘head. An I’m meetin’ my pa. Yer pa too. Family all the same”. 

Danny chuckles and nods a little, “yeah yeah I get it alright. Still gonna think it’s a stupid idea and be mildly paranoid that the psycho will try to off my just recently discovered half-sibling”, grumbling, “I’m a protective guy. Overprotective if you ask literally anyone other than me. Well, other than Vlad too. He’ll just say I'm a naive teen playing superhero wasting my potential, and will one day join him to rule the world”. Flynn huffs but stays silent, so Danny continues, “so to explain things. Sam and Tuck, my two best friends, and my-our sister Jazz, all know about the halfa thing. Jazz is studying psychology and is honestly disturbingly smart. She psychoanalysed a guy who took over the world for a while into becoming a ghost”, shrugging, “sure he became human again later, but still”. 

Flynn shakes his head, “impressive. Am I oldar?”. 

Danny nods, “she’s almost eighteen, so yeah. You’re the eldest, congrats”, shaking his head, “Now if only you were around for her ‘I’m older so I know better’ phase”. Flynn chuckles at that. “Now Tuck is a techno-geek, pretty sure he might actually be attracted to technology some days. His current PDA is named Lisa, he calls her babe and kisses her. Also doesn’t eat fruits or veggies, which really makes me wonder how he’s healthy. He really shouldn’t be”.

“I don’ know what is ‘healthy’ fer a human”, then sounding quite sure of himself, “he is attracted to technology”. Which Danny chuckles over. 

Danny shakes his head, “yeah I guess you have a lot to learn about humans actually. Jazz might take it upon herself to teach you _everything_ , so maybe be careful on that. She forgets she’s smarter than pretty well everyone”, shaking his head again as they curve around some free-floating rocks, “now Sam is a goth, which just means she wears a lot of black, is really into being unique, vaguely hates the government and society, and likes all things dark and morbid. She only eats plants, which is also totally unhealthy. She made the school serve grass and soil once as lunch”. 

Flynn blinks slowly and frowns, “that’s disgustin’”. 

Danny nods, “yup. Her doing that also summoned a very angry lunch-related ghost. Which I had to fight. The LinchLady, who’s dating the BoxGhost and will one day have a daughter with him”.

Flynn grunts, “BoxGhost is very annoyin’”. 

Danny grumbling, “tell me about it. I have to fight that idiot, like, three times a day. He once showed up to fight me _twenty-four times_ in a single day. I was not impressed. I think he’s a masochist”. Flynn chuckles and chokes a little at that. “Back to Sam. She also happens to be the heiress to the Manson family fortune, she’ll be the thirtieth richest person on the planet when her nana -bless her heart- passes. Pretty sure me and Tuck are getting some of the money too actually. Nana Ida is awesome”, tilting his head, “and I’m pretty sure Vlad has me listed as his only heir. No clue what’s gonna happen with you”. 

Flynn shrugs, wobbling in the air a little, “he’s my pa, not ya’s”. 

Danny rubs his neck, flipping to be flying on his back, “I’m not sure he’ll care. He wants me because I’m a halfa, like him. That’s the other thing that worries me. If he’ll take issue with you being human, all human”. 

Flynn huffs, “I ain’t dyin’”. 

Danny gives an awkward but strong, “good”. Speaking back up after a bit, “where we flying anyway?”.

“Go where it takes me”. 

Danny snorts, “yup, nomad”, shaking his head with a small smile, “could head to my lair here. There’s a portal to my Mortal Realm bedroom there. Folks also have a functioning portal that opens up into my house's basement”. Flynn hums noncommittally. “What? Don’t what to go to the Mortal Realm yet?”. 

Flynn huffs, “I have a brother”, and glances at Danny. Danny blinks, guess the guy wanted to ‘get to know’ him slightly first. Neat. 

Danny grins, “well I could just show you the place. My lair. I’m not there much but it’s a home all the same. Also have some ghost family you could meet at some point. Plus, it’ll take a while to fly to any of the places; though I could just teleport us to speed things up”. 

Flynn shakes his head, “uncommon power. Ya lair’s fine. Safe?”. Danny nods immediately, “safe yup, only ghosts usually there is me, Frighty, Cujo, and the skele-drones”. 

“Ya lost me, shorty”. Regardless Flynn follows after Danny as Danny readjusts their trajectory to be heading to his lair. 

Danny chuckles, “I’m assuming you know what drone ghosts are?”.

“Servants, more er less. Less sentient than the blobs”. 

Danny nods, “got it in one”, chuckling awkwardly, “I’ve got around four billion at my becking call. And Frighty is just what I call the FrightKnight because it’s funny”. 

Flynn flips his arms up and forward to halt his flight/gliding, glares at Danny, then turns to land on a little island. Glaring back at Danny and pointing firmly at the ground. 

Danny chuckles awkwardly and rubs his neck while floating over to the island, not landing though and just letting his ghostly tail twitch about in the air. “Heh, yeah. Surprise?”. 

Flynn glares more, “explain. The FrightKnight serves Pariah an ya have an army”. 

Danny chuckles very awkwardly and resumes his neck rubbing, “well you see, when Vlad went and released Pariah he left me to fight the guy ‘cause Vlad lured him into the Mortal Realm resulting in Pariah abducting my entire Mortal Realm lair. Kinda had to fight the guy after that. Needless to say, since I haven’t been wiped out of existence and Pariah’s not rampaging around, I licked his ass”, shrugging while Flynn just stares at him, “and since our little fight was one-on-one it pretty much counted as dethronement and under Might Gives Right -which is pretty much just the rule of conquest in case you don’t know- the guy who does said dethroning takes the throne. So yeah, you’re currently having a conversation with and are related to the High Ghost King. Ruler of all ghosts and the entirety of the Infinite Realm”, Danny cringes a little.

Flynn glares at him, squints, and sits down. Unwrapping one of his bottle pouches and taking a swig. Danny blinks and floats over, sniffing at the bottle while Flynn seemingly ignores his existence. Danny scrunching up his nose, “you made ghost liquor?”. 

Flynn huffs, “course. Pain killer an helps suffer through ghosts”, and glares at Danny. Clearly blaming the halfa for his current need to drink. 

Danny rubs his neck, “hey, I’m well aware my half-life is bullshit. Just to get the startling shit out of the way. My granted Guardian’s ClockWork, who’s the Lord Of Time aka a King and basically the god of time. My two standing Guardians are FrostBite and Pandora. The Chief or King of the FarFrozen and the Queen of Mythos. My standing nestmate or ghostly sister is Dorothea, I call her Dora though, who’s the Queen of Draconics. Also pretty close with Oberon the King Of The Fairlands and Nocturne the Lord or King of Reverlithe aka the dreamscape. Tuck is the born-again Pharaoh or King of Ranatheo, and Sam is the granted daughter of UnderGrowth the Lord or King of Botany”. 

Flynn chokes and takes another sip of his drink. 

Danny chuckles awkwardly and floats to sit down, “Jazz is considered the High Ghost Princess, Being my sister and all. So technically you, being my half-brother, are the High Ghost Prince. Congrats, you upgraded from nomad to nomadic High Prince”. 

Flynn takes another sip, “ya, ya Zone damned moron, are insane”. 

Danny shrugs, “more like unlucky and constantly landing ass over elbows into fucked up situations, but powerful enough to not get totally fucked over by them. Vlad’s evil plot caused the High King thing. Met Dora ‘cause her abusive brother tried to marry Sam after she accidentally won a beauty contest she entered purely out of spite. Met Pandora because Boxy stole her box and brought it to my Mortal Realm lair and opened the damn thing like an idiot. Met FrostBite when I got lost and crash-landed, then again when my Core nearly froze me to full death. Met ClockWork due to an alternate timeline where an evil version of myself annihilated humanity, that one was really not fun. Nocturne sent my entire Mortal Lair to sleep and abducted me. Why he picked the place I call home I have no idea. Oberon literally just showed up one day trying to adopt me and _would not_ stop till I revealed I already had a granted Guardian and then tried to adopt my sister”, blinking then snapping his fingers and pointing at Flynn, “oh also, you’re an uncle. I have a daughter. You can thank Vlad for that”, continuing when Flynn gives him a disturbed look, “guy stole my DNA and cloned me a couple times. Elle’s the only one that survived. Don’t ask me why she’s a girl and looks twelve, I have no idea. She’s also a halfa, That part shouldn’t be surprising though”. 

Flynn glares at him and proceeds to use his staff to ‘gently nudge’ -read: jab- Danny over the edge. Danny obviously just floats back up. Flynn shaking his head and looking out into the vast of the Infinite Realm, “got ‘nother image?”. 

Danny nods and digs into his pocket, digging in his wallet again. Handing the photo over, “funny enough, she’s something of a nomad herself. Except she mostly wanders around the Mortal Realm”, shaking his head and putting his hands on his hips, “really wish she’d come say hi more often”. 

Flynn huffs, “looks like ya”, and hands the photo back then capping his drinking and retying it to his belt. Standing up, pointing the staff tip at Danny, “ya still insane. Tho less. Death hates ya”. 

Danny shrugs, “honestly? Yeah”, tilting his head, “oh also also, Vlad’s the mayor of my Mortal Realm lair. Means he’s in charge of the town. He became mayor to spite me”, rubbing his neck, “was also kinda part of a prank war we were having. I might have blown his home up once or twice and got him naked in front of basically the whole world”, grumbling, “he did the naked thing to me right back though. And nailing a dead badger to my door was pretty disgusting”. 

Flynn shakes his head, “true ghost ya are. Both ya”. Danny chuckles and nods. Poking Danny with his staff again, “jus teleport me ta ya lair, now that I know what I’m in fer”. Danny also chuckles at that but nods, teleporting with an overdramatic finger snap and swirl of green. 

* * *

Flynn shakes his head at the high ceiling, silver and gold embroidered banners with Danny’s DP on them, large trees peppered with flowers lining the walls; then eyeing the black and white angular gem-covered throne and shaking his head very specifically at that. Lowering his staff and holding it threateningly when an Observant floats in. 

Danny groans loudly, tilting his head back with the sound, “Ancients fuck, there’s no problem to be dealt with, you can go away, you damn eyeball”, glaring at the obnoxious all-seeing douche bag, “and no trying to assassinate my new fam. Yes that is a threat”.

The Observant holds up a finger, “but-”.

“No no. I don’t have to listen to you”, Danny then floats at them making shooing motions at them towards the door, forcing them to leave, “shoo shoo you. **Be gone** ”. Then nodding curtly at the door banging shut. 

Danny turning back to Flynn, who’s still pointing the staff threateningly but at the door and look befuddled again. “Ya ‘shoo’ed Observant”. 

Danny shrugs, “they hate me. Try to assassinate me occasionally, before I got crowned properly anyway”, Danny then grinning meanly and floating to show the guy around, “now I _own them_ and they can’t do shit”. Flynn shakes his head as he follows Danny around, looking slightly more paranoid though. Danny finger gunning at him, “oh Vlad is also on their shit list because he broke into their courthouse and freed a prisoner, Vortex”, shrugging, “Vlad wanted to use him to control the weather to get better approval ratings as the mayor. Expectantly, it went wrong and I had to fight Vortex”. 

Flynn shakes his head before sticking it in Danny’s bedroom, “pa is insane, I agree now. Still pa”. Danny snickers at that. 

Not even ten minutes later they run into the FrightKnight, with Flynn -expectantly at this point- pointing his staff at the tall full ghost. The FrightKnight bowing to Danny, “my liege, may I ask what’s brought you?”, then straightening, glancing over Flynn, and looking to Danny clearly judgementally and disbelievingly. 

Danny chuckles and puts a hand on his hip, gesturing loosely to Flynn with the other hand, “‘patently Vladdie had a kid with my mom in another timeline who’s been living in the Ghost Zone for fourteen years. Cropped up here three months ago. Meet my older half-brother, Flynn”. 

The FrightKnight turns to the side and sighs, like doing so will make said sigh go unnoticed, then turns back. Bowing to Flynn, who is clearly squinting in disbelief, “blessed meet then, High Prince. May deaths bite not mark thee before the time is true”. Turning back to Danny while Flynn furrows his eyebrows. “Traveller? So would the Traveller Prince or the Nomad Prince suffice well?”. 

Danny hums, tapping his chin, “hmmm I don’t know”, looking to Flynn, “what do you think? Ghosts like having descriptors, in case you don’t know”, grinning, “Jazz is considered the Mind-wise Princess, Elle the Wanderlust Princess, and I’m the Suffered King”. 

Flynn gives him a look that implies Danny’s crazy. Which is fair. “... Travellar Prince is... fine”. The FrightKnight nods respectfully. 

The FrightKnight looking back to Danny, “shall I inform Plasmius of this or do you wish me torment him for causing you hassles again, your highness”. 

Danny snorts, “well _this_ Vlad didn’t do anything, so kinda pointless. Also-”, smirking, “-I’d rather surprise him. Gotta find some way to get back at him for throwing my old suit through an industrial meat grinder so my folks would force me to let him buy me a new one. Though maybe try finding my little gumdrop, and go ahead and inform my non-omniscient Guardians and nestmate”. Probably not smart to drag Flynn around to a bunch of ghost kingdoms, guy clearly was more of a lone wolf kinda guy. 

The FrightKnight nods acceptingly, “as you desire, sire”. Flynn follows the FrightKnight with his staff tip as the ghost takes his leave. Looking back to Danny, “ya have lived wilder than I”, then squinting, “half-lived wilder”. Making Danny grin stupidly. 

Danny doesn’t get to comment though and Flynn spins around and points the staff at ClockWork appearing out of nowhere in their child form. Danny shaking his head fondly and floating over, hugging the ghost and smacking their arm, “y’all are gonna give Flynn a heart attack if you guys keep popping up like this. Not that popping up suddenly and startling people isn’t your thing”. 

Flynn huffs, “I am unbothered by an well used to ghosts suddenness. Not ones of such... level, is all”. Danny gets that, kinda hard to avoid ghosts doing things suddenly when you lived in the freaking Zone. 

ClockWork grins, “I am not a frequently showing or well known one. But as has been said, family is family”. Flynn just nods at that. While Danny knows that’s a snide way to say Flynn really should see Vlad. Fucking dandy. Wonderful. 

Danny looking back to ClockWork, “speaking of that, you gave me that photo because of this, didn’t you?”.

“Maybe so, maybe not. The decision is yours to make”. That response just makes Danny groan like a petulant child. ClockWork holding up a finger at Danny, “maybe _someone_ will better heed my advice next time and not meddle where meddling is unneeded”, ruffling Danny’s hair yet sounding scolding, “you may have undone what was, but what reason have I to rid a young man, whose done no wrong nor bears any ill will, of his existence”. 

Flynn grunts, “I appreciate livin’”. 

ClockWork chuckles ever so slightly while Danny blushes green. “As I am well aware. Though had you lived different, you may have found yourself less fond of living. Vladimir is a far broken man”. Danny cringes at that with Flynn frowning. ClockWork then hands Danny a book, “Misery Vex is written in there”. 

Danny looks down at the dictionary-sized book, “but it’s huge!”. 

ClockWork smirks, “as is the time-stream. I hardly heard you complaining when you asked me to look through it for a specific entry”. Danny grumbles incoherently but decides that fine, point goddamn made. Flynn shaking his head though chuckling faintly as ClockWork disappears in a poof. 

Flynn tapping his staff on the floor after a bit and twisting it in, “then this is my best life? To not be with ma an pa?”. 

Danny cringes at that and rubs his neck, “guess so. Can’t say I’m surprised”, sighing, “when Vlad made Elle he could’ve had her as the child he wanted. Instead he tried to murder her because she wasn’t just like me”, scowling, “wasn’t the ‘perfect halfa son’”. 

Flynn frowns, “ya worry ‘bout me makes sense”. Danny just snorts at that. 

Danny not so tactfully changes the subject, eyeing Flynn’s bark armour and tattered hand-made clothes, “you know, we could get the dressers to do you up all nice and stuff. Get you some decent armour even”. 

Flynn huffs and shakes his head, “‘fraid not. I trust an like what’s mine”. 

Danny nods approvingly at that. Nice, self-sufficient and liked it that way. “I don’t take much advantage of their services either. They always make me feel stupidly overdressed. I have, like, a bajillion capes. And don’t get me started on the stuff they’ve tried to do to my poor hair”, giving a very fake annoyed groan, “pretty well haveta for anything super official and royal though”, shrugging, “if I can I just get away with my natural cape and the royal artifacts obviously”. Flynn looks him over questioningly as they start walking around again. Danny gestures over himself while summoning out his cape, crown, and ring. The capes white flaming collar bursting to life making Flynn twitch his staff slightly; which Danny snickers at, his black cape with white lining swaying faintly in the nonexistent wind. 

Flynn eyeballs the crown and huffs, “dramatic”. Danny grinning readily since yeah, it was dramatic, excessive, unnecessary. Hence why he seldom had any of it out. Well, he liked having the ring out as a little more discreet reminder of just _who_ he was. 

* * *

They walk into one of his many halls, Flynn glancing around at the banners hanging around. Decorated with stained glass-style depictions of Danny in various battles, a scene of his ice training with the FarFrozen, his crowning, a hyper-stylised one of his death, showing off his wail taking out a whole army, one really big one of him sitting on his throne, etcetera. Danny walking up to one depicting him knighting Sam and Tucker simultaneously -which never happened, he did them each on their own- with Jazz and Elle on either side of him. Tapping the characters on it in order, “Sam. Tuck. Jazz. Elle”, looking to Flynn, “really you should be in this one since you’re family and know about my ghostliness”, looking back to the tapestry, “my folks will get added whenever I decide to tell them and they accept me”. 

Flynn hums and leans to inspect the hanging fabric, “ya know they will yet don’. Moron”, shaking his head and huffing, “ya can add me”, shaking his head again, “ridiculous”. 

Danny chuckles, “no clue what the ‘ridiculous’ is to, probably right though”, tapping the tapestry and snickering to himself over making Flynn twitch over it changing with a little flap in the air. Elle now sat cross-legged at his feet, with Flynn to the side of him. “And maybe I will when they stop spending diners talking about how they’d love to graphically dissect Danny Phantom”. Flynn grimaces at that. Danny blinks at turns back to him, “oh and my human last name is Fenton by the way. In case you don’t know, yours would be Masters”. 

Flynn nods, “I had forgotten, yes”, then grins a little, “Masters”; sounding like he’s trying out the feel of the name on his tongue.

“You can take Fenton if Vladdie pisses you off too much”; earning Danny a slight glare. Danny shrugs with a grin, “I didn’t say permanently, though you could do that. And mom is a Fenton so...”, tilting his head, “well okay, she would have been a Masters in your timeline. Alternate timelines are confusing”. 

Flynn shakes his head, “agreed”, then glances around again, “dramatic”, pointing to one depicting Danny from the back raining ice down on UnderGrowth, “seen that one carved in rocks”.

Danny snorts, “not surprising, I’ve ran into cave paints of me. And that was _before_ I got crowned”. Making Flynn shake his head, just as Dora basically softly bangs open the doors. Her running up to Danny, grabbing his hands, and looking at his eyes like they were made of stars. Flynn backing up some and watching in silent caution. 

“I came as fast as one can! He is not an unsavoury lad? You are well?”.

Danny chuckles at her and smiles softly, “relax, sweet Aurora, the only thing he’s got in common with Aragon is bad hair”, looking to Flynn, “no offence”. The guy's hair _was_ a matted mess, probably didn’t own a hairbrush and tidy hair wasn’t exactly vital for survival. Flynn shrugs and goes back to eyeing Dora carefully. 

Dora snaps her head to look at Flynn, having to look up a bit due to the height difference. Her squinting at him with him scratching his head as she clearly appraises him. “Your garments are self-woven and well worn. A man of resourcefulness who values use and worth over frivolous beauty”. 

Flynn huffs, “eh, frilly shirt’s jus frilly, a knife keeps ya alive”, snorting and jabbing a thumb towards Danny, “or alive enough”; making Danny grin. 

Dora giggles softly with a hand over her mouth. Walking over gracefully and thumbing his clothing. Flynn watching her hand cautiously and twitching his staff, clearly making it clear he’s ready to defend himself at a moment's notice. Her humming and nodding curtly, “it’s nice stitch-work”, then putting her face close to his and staring into his eyes. Flynn leaning away a little but not breaking the eye contact. Dora humming again, “you’re worn but not unkind, and have seen the world rather than merely heard of it”, and quickly skipping back over to Danny. Sounding almost chiding at Danny, “and almost as paranoid and guarded as you”. Her looking back to Flynn, “though you’ll have to excuse me if I don’t see you as a brother of mine, though an acceptable brother of my nestmate still”, and ducks her head to be under Danny’s for a second before straightening out into the picture of a prim and proper gentle queen. 

Flynn shakes his head a little, though relaxes some and leans against a wall, “good by me. My family’s growin’ enough ‘ready”. Dora giggles slightly again, Danny’s willing to bet it’s over the way Flynn speaks. Especially because Vlad is going to _hate it._ It’s not even spitting distance close to ‘proper rich high and mighty’. 

The room almost seems to shake when a booming voice shouts out, “WHERE IS HE!?!”. Resulting in Flynn jerking off the wall and pointing his staff at the doorway, eyeing Pandora and grunting in annoyance as she barges in. Danny looking and whispering to Dora, “he might be just _a little_ trigger happy. Which he obviously gets from mom”. Vlad was a planner not a ‘stab the shit outta the threat with a stick the second It has the guts to show Its face in easy reach’. Flynn was clearly the stabbing option but with at least enough restraint to actually evaluate if whatever was actually a threat. Good man. Stabbing Pandora would be dumb and unnecessary; though he might impress her if he succeeds. And if Flynn hadn’t been around ghosts longer than Danny has been one, then he might have given the guy points for his only reaction to Pandora’s towering height being looking up more. 

Pandora blinks down at Flynn before grinning wide, “well someone’s certainly quick to the draw. I approve”.

Danny sighing, “you so need higher standards than ‘willing to stab a bitch’”. 

“He doesn’t have the air of a thief, what else could I need if he’s family?”. 

Danny shrugs, “fair play”, while Pandora grabs him up in a hug; Dora smiling softly all the while. Danny patting Pandora’s shoulder, “yup, good to see you too, Mythic Ma, but don’t break my ribs and arms”. She laughs but does plant him back down on the ground. Poking his arm, “bones are an interesting thing”. 

Flynn glances at his arm, though not letting Pandora out of his sight, “yah. Painful too”. Making Danny groan, “tell me about it”. Flynn gives him a funny look so Danny adds on, “not literally. Figure of speak, man”. 

“Ah”.

Dora giggles, “yes, sir Phantom has many funny sayings”. Danny rolls his eyes fondly at that. Pandora laughs loudly, then crosses her four arms and gives Flynn a stern look, “though if you hurt this rascal, I’ll kill you”. Flynn just glares, obviously used to sudden random death threats. 

Danny rolls his eyes, looking to Flynn, “don't worry, she’s said that to, like, thirty people since we met. Including Vlad about four times; she has yet to actually kill him and probably never will”, shrugging, “him frequently doing said hurting me or not”. 

Pandora huffs at the air, “hardly worth the effort”, grinning down at Danny, “and he’s _your_ archenemy”, uncrossing one set of her arms to wag a finger at him, “an archenemy is a special thing and we must value them”, laughing, “plus you’d probably rain down the entire Realm on anyone who genuinely hurt him”. Danny grumbles with a spreading blush. 

Flynn quirks an eyebrow, “why? Ya think he’s crazy an bad”. 

Pandora grins and pats Danny’s back hard, “half a ghost is still a ghost. We protect what’s ours and Plasmius is _his_ ”. Which just makes Danny blush more. 

Flynn just quirks his eyebrow higher so Danny awkwardly explains, “ah right, I go by Phantom, he goes by Plasmius”; only to then get tackled by a little black and white blur. This time Flynn manages to just twitch his staff rather than actually point it at the newcomer. Probably due to smaller size and going for Danny. Someone surprise tackling Flynn probably wouldn’t end well for anyone. He does incline the staff towards FrostBite when the big yeti enters though; even if FrostBite’s chuckling. Size matters y’all, apparently anyways. 

Danny laughs and ruffles up Elle’s hair from the floor, her sitting on his stomach, “hey little lady! Where you been?”. She hums mysteriously and looks around exaggeratedly. Though the FrightKnight sticks his head in and answers for her, “she was hunting alongside SnowPelt and WinterSong of the FarFrozen, sire”. Danny gives FrostBite a comically shocked and affronted look, “and you didn’t tell me?!?”. 

FrostBite scratches his head, “I was unaware myself actually. That’s a sneaky one you got on your hands, Great One”. 

Flynn had been vaguely looking like he was attempting to blend in with the wall and find cover under a hanging tapestry until the ‘Great One’ comment actually registered. Him stepping forward slightly and poking Danny with the base of his staff, “‘Great One’? Ego”. 

Danny blushes and glares, “hey. I didn’t choose that”. Elle giggles wrapping her arms around Danny’s neck and dangling down as he pushes himself to stand back up. 

FrostBite smirks, telling Danny the guy was very aware of Danny’s embarrassment over the title. “The members of the FarFrozen gave him that name. He saved the Realm from the Mad King after all, ‘tis only fitting”, grinning wolfishly and patting Danny’s head, “to us he is more god than king”. Danny scowls up at the furry paw. 

Elle giggling even more at his expense while moving to sit on his shoulders as FrostBite retracts his paw. Flynn happens to be chuckling to, so Danny sticks his tongue out at him. That gets Elle to notice Flynn though, looking to him, “you look nothing like murder father”, and shaking her head aggressively, Danny points up at her, “same hairstyle”. 

“You got a problem with ponytails!”. 

Danny puts his hands up, “nope. Not a problem in sight, bubblegum”. Earning a huff and head bop from Elle. 

Flynn blinks, grabs the end of his ‘ponytail’ that can barely actually be called that, and looks back to Elle with a quirked eyebrow, “‘murder father’?”. 

Danny chuckles, “she means Vlad. She calls him that since he made her and she used to just call him father, but well, murder attempts kinda change how you view someone”, pointing to himself, “she calls me pops”, chuckling, “maybe don’t think too hard about the fact that she calls your dad ‘father’ and me ‘pops’”. 

Elle goes wide-eyed, “oh! Does that make him my brother?”. 

“What?!? NO!”. 

Flynn smirks a little, “it rather does”. 

Danny makes an exaggerated x motion with his hands, “NO. My half-brother also being vaguely sorta my son slash daughters bother is so many leaps and bounds past the line of fucked up that I refuse!”, holding up a finger, “plus, she’s not related to him at all”. 

Flynn doesn’t drop the smirk, “her an I only share a pa. Yer not my pa. So her half-brother by pa an yer half-brother by ma”. 

Danny screws up his face, “I’m gonna murder you in your sleep with an ice pick”, screwing his face up more while Dora turns to the side to stifle her laughter, the others not even hiding their grins. “Fuck, I hate that that makes any amount of sense. But Ancients damnit, she’s _still_ not related to him”. 

FrostBite chuckles, “splendid choice of instruments of death”. Pandora nodding though definitely not for the same ice-repeated reasons. 

Danny rolls his eyes at Flynn’s squinting, “I like empty death threats as much as the next ghost”. Grinning, “why I just told Vlad last week that I would shove hot coals up his ass and a paint mixer in his stomach”. Flynn clearly has no clue what a paint mixer is but seems to accept the answer anyway. So Danny huffs and points from Flynn to Elle and back, “anyway, uncle, niece. Not brother, sister”. Earning fond smirks and eye rolls, plus some giggling from Elle. Danny grumbles incoherently over that. 

Flynn doesn’t seem to care about pressing the issue at least. The guy eyeing FrostBite, “yer a fighter”, poking FrostBites little waist sash with the base of his staff, “live off the land ta”, and eyes the icy arm understandingly. Gesturing the staff at Pandora, “ya ta”. Looking at Danny, “fightin’ a family thing”. 

Danny chuckles and puts his hands on his hips, “you should see my armour”. With Dora giggling, “which set?”. Making Danny rub his neck. 

Pandora grins and nods approvingly, “traditional battle and sword skills are highly prized in Mythos”, looking to FrostBite, “and the FarFrozen are a tribe of seasoned warriors”. Earning a wolfish grin from the yeti. 

Elle mock punches the air a few times, “and I’ve got some skills!”. Which Danny pats her head fondly over. 

Dora hums softly and shakes her head, “I prefer peace, but if I must I will fight. For the good of my people and the respect of myself”, and letting her eyes change to threatening slits for a second. 

Flynn huffs, “I do what I must, nothin’ more, nothin’ less”. Danny chuckles awkwardly, Flynn unlike everyone else here was more in the ‘getting by’ category than the ‘well off and flourishing’ category. Well technically Elle just ‘got by’ but she knew damn well there were plenty places she could go. Flynn had been pretty well on his own, with only himself to rely on; and the world around him technically. He had taken advantage and good use of the world, hadn’t really bested it though. No, Danny was the one that made the Zone his bitch. 

FrostBite laughs at Danny, “I remember when you would say the same!”, and goes to smack Flynn on the back with a laugh, though only does it once when Flynn twitches the staff at him and squints. 

Danny rolls his eyes but doesn’t respond as his phone goes off. Digging the thing out of his pocket, resulting in all the full ghosts and Flynn -which is kinda hilarious- staring at the device. Danny’s not surprised it’s Tucker asking what the fucks up and telling him that ‘Skulker’s taking a beating from Red and if Danny wants the video ‘cause her ass looks great in it. Oh and Wulf’s in town’, Danny just shakes his head at that. You’d think Tucker would chill out the creep factor if he actually wanted a girlfriend, but no. The ghosts all chuckle, Flynn just squints at the device. Making Danny quirk an eyebrow, “do you not know how to read or something?”. 

Earning more squinting from Flynn but actually directed at Danny this time, “I don’ do readin’, shorty”, and huffs. 

Danny blinks and chuckles, “yeah guess reading isn’t a requirement for a wandering Ghost Zone nomad”, earning more squinting and a jab in the side from the staff. Elle pokes Danny’s leg, “I only know how ‘cause you know”. Which really just reminds Danny that she’s not even kinda in school. Her shrugging, “well and Grandfather Clock”, tilting her head, “and GhostWriter”. Dora puts a hand to her chest and Pandora quirks an eyebrow, so Elle adds, “and Aunty Dora and Grandma Pandora”. Her frowning and basically shouting at the ceiling, “okay everyone teaches me!”. 

Danny chuckles down at her, “everyone loves a Phantom in their own way. Sometimes with violence, sometimes teaching”, grinning, “Skulker does try to teach me hunting practices too, you know”. Flynn just looks confused. 

Dora sticks up a finger, “and it rather infuriates Plasmius”; making everyone smirk meanly... Except Flynn, who squints, “does erry ghost hate my pa, er somethin’?”. 

Everyone looks to him and speak in unison, “yes”. Danny chuckling at the guy, “when you release Pariah, causing the Realm to basically have to evacuate, in a ploy to rule over all other ghosts, you kinda make it onto everyone’s shit list”. 

Pandora nods curtly, “especially if you fail at it”, and shakes her head in disappointment. 

Flynn doesn’t even get a chance to comment on or even think about that as he, Pandora, and FrostBite all point various weapons at the ceiling and Danny takes a slight fighting stance when a portal opens up and a ball of people crash into the floor. 


	4. Inexperienced Humanity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flynn gets to meet some humans, creatures that he has effectively no experience with, and takes a trip back to his mortal birth realm.

Danny sighs and relaxes when the ball scrambles apart. Skulker glancing around, going wide-eyed at realising where, exactly, he is, and looks back to Danny while waving his hands back and forth, “I didn’t do it!”, and promptly bolts out. Danny gets it, attack Phantom in Amity? Cool sounds like a fun time. Attack Phantom in Phantom’s Keep? Oh fuck no, _run_. In Amity, he was just the town’s ghostly protector. In his Keep, he was King. 

Wulf stands up and gives Danny an apologetic shrug, resulting in everyone but Flynn dropping the aggressive stances. Tucker’s muttering ‘fuck’ as he slips repeatedly, Sam smacking him over the head while calling him ‘an idiot’ probably doesn’t help. Red grumbles loudly, shaking her hands off and practically growling, “ugh! Are all ghosts dogs out to get me!”. 

Danny turns to Flynn, “I swear this isn’t the daily normal”. Flynn side-eyes him and huffs, though relaxes some. But Danny blinks, shit right Valerie doesn’t exactly know the whole Phantom/Fenton thing, grabbing Flynn’s arm, “shit right, the girl in Red does not know about the me being a Halfa thing, so no mentioning you’re related to Phantom”. Flynn grunts at him before shaking his head and chuckling slightly. 

Wulf comes around the side of Danny that is not next to Flynn, obviously picking up that the guy wasn’t the most social type. Promptly giving Danny a good sniff and lick. Danny grumbling fondly, “like always Wulf, ew”. 

Wulf just grins, “ĉu lasi ilin ĉe vi? Skulker ŝtelis mian manĝon kaj mi reakiras ĝin” (leave them with you? Skulker stole my food and I’m getting it back). Danny waves him off, “jes iru detrui tiun metalan azenon” (yeah go shred that metal ass). Wulf grins more and runs off. 

Pandora glances around and nods to herself, “we best go as well”, smirking, “wouldn’t want to ruin your hall with a battle, now would we”; and promptly hugs Danny. Dora giving him a cheek kiss and FrostBite patting his head. 

Danny honestly sighs and sags happily at them managing to leave before Valerie stops ranting to herself. Danny also telekinetically rolls up all the wall scrolls, can’t let Val see that stuff. Tucker and Sam have just been silently observing, and probably judging Danny for something stupid he’s doing, that or eyeing Flynn. Probably eyeing Flynn, human plus in the Ghost Zone is a staring worthy offence. Danny discretely -or trying to be discreet anyway- texting them that he has a ‘other timeline half-brother’. He’s pretty sure Sam’s judgmental look is aimed at him now and Tucker’s chuckling to the side quietly, “only you, dude. Only you”.

Valerie/Red gestures around wildly, “where even am I!?!”. Elle picking that exact moment to basically tackle the huntress in a hug, “Aunty!”. 

Flynn quirks an eyebrow at Danny, so he explains, “Red, the girl in red Elle just hug-tackled, helped save Elle’s life once. They’ve been close ever since”. 

Valerie pauses her ranting and does a mood one-eighty, hugging Elle, “oh hey girl! Thank fuck for a friendly face”, turning her head to glare at Sam and Tucker, “who don’t jump into ghost fights like idiots. What were you two even thinking?!?”. 

Tucker waves her off nonchalantly, “I was aiming for Wulf. Us Esperanto speakers got to stick together”. Helmet or no, it’s very obvious Valerie’s glaring. 

Danny shakes his head, “as, uh, _interesting_ as a bunch of humans dropping into my lair is, there’s a portal in the back so you can, you know, leave”. 

Valerie snaps her head to him, then glances around, “huh, not what I expected from you, Phantom”. Danny just groans, “I’m not here often”. Her then noticing Flynn, who squints at her, then looking back to Danny and clearly she’s unimpressed. 

She sounds more than a little accusing, “and here I thought you _didn’t_ abduct humans”. Sam and Tucker are clearly just trying to stay out of this, them both slowly trying to sneak off to where they know Danny’s got his portal located; Elle subtlety flying off far faster than either full human can walk. 

Flynn grunts, “I live ‘er”. Valerie puts her hands on her hips so Danny holds up his hands, “he means the Zone, Red. Not my lair”. Even if the entire Zone was basically Danny’s lair. 

Sam apparently can’t keep her mouth shut about that, “what? But humans are practically an invasive species. The ecological issues that could cause”. 

Both Danny and Valerie respond with, “seriously?”, looking equally dumbfounded and judgmental. Sam huffs, crosses her arms, rolls her eyes, and spins around; grabbing Tucker’s arm and stalking off. Valerie blinks after them, “where are they even going?”.

Danny sighs, “you're not the only human to get abducted by some ghost into the Zone”, making a point to slightly laugh, “the goth's mouth gets her on a lot of ghosts radars”, sighing again, “she knows how to get herself back”. 

Valerie shakes her head, clearly looks Flynn up and down, and walks over slowly, “and what about him?”, looking specifically at Flynn, “how’d you even get here? You’re not from Amity and just _how long_ have you been here?”. Flynn takes a slight step back and puts his staff head against her chest to keep her back. 

Danny blinks at that, looking from the staff to Flynn, “it’s been a while since you’ve seen another human, huh?”. Flynn gives Danny a squint, “she ain’t no human”. Making both Valerie and Danny choke slightly. “Feels like a ghost, but wrong”. 

Danny facepalms, “she’s human, Flynn. Her suit just has an ecto-field, like a ghost does, because it runs off ectoplasm. Y’ know, like ghosts run off ectoplasm”. 

Valerie nods, deactivating her helmet to make a point; her obviously aware they are effectively alone now, “it lets me fight them on an even playing field”, looking to Danny, “but seriously, Phantom, explain”. 

Flynn huffs, “I can explain fer myself”, and squints at her. Continuing when she looks to him, “ghost brought me ‘er through my ma an pa’s portal fourteen years ago”, shrugging, “‘parently different timeline tho. Been this one some months”. 

Valerie looks slowly to Danny, “seriously”. Danny shrugs and nods, “crazier things have happened. Maybe”, chuckling, “blame Vlad”. Valerie groans loudly, “what did that psychotic manipulative piece of shit bastard do now?”. 

“An what did my pa do ta ya”, Flynn sounds accusing, curious, and exasperated. Valerie snaps her head to him, “YOUR ‘PA’!”. Danny sighs, “yeah. He got together with Maddie apparently”.

“WHAT!”. Valerie shakes her head, “but she _hates_ him and would probably shoot him point-blank in the face if someone even vaguely asked her to”. 

Danny nods with a grin, “I know right?”. Shaking his head, “not being a ghost apparently changed things for the old rich nutcase”. Valerie shakes her head disbelievingly, hands on her hips. 

Flynn huffs, poking Valerie with his staff again, “ya didn’ answer”. Everyone can easily hear her sigh, “simply put, he manipulated my fourteen-year-old self's passionate ghost hatred into becoming a ghost hunter that did his dirty work. Bastard set the suit he gave me to explode and kill me just to frame Phantom here. Not to mention tried to make me an accomplice for murder when he used me to capture Elle so he could kill her”, her scowling, “fuck that bastard of a man”. 

Flynn looks to Danny, “is there any that don’ hate my pa?”. 

“He has a cat”. 

Valerie crosses her arms, “well maybe actually having a kid with ‘the woman of his dreams’”, rolling her eyes, “will snap some sense into that screwed up head of his”.

Danny points at her, “I wouldn’t count on it, but here’s hoping”, looking to Flynn, “I don’t _want_ him to fuck things up with you or make you yet another person he could have been close to but instead chose to take advantage of”. Flynn huffs but nods his agreement. 

Valerie nods as well but looks to Danny, “as fun as discovering Vlad’s latest issue is, where’s this portal at?”, glaring, “and _he’s_ ”, pointing at Flynn, “coming with. Even if it seems like he’s done fine here-”, looking to Flynn, “which that’s damn impressive by the way”, looking back to Danny, “-he’s still _human_. He should be with humans and human society”, sighing almost pained, “and if he likes ghosts or feels more comfortable with them, Amity will suit him fine”, frowning, “I don’t know about him moving in with Vlad though...”. 

Danny snorts, “oh yeah have the nomadic loner whose lived longer around ghosts than humans and in caves and shit go move into a bloody _mansion_ with a world-class manipulator and no other people but servants. That’s _real smart_ ”. Danny could see just how bloody well horrible that would go already. 

Flynn huffs, “I can choose fer myself”, and squints at both of them; making both cringe slightly. But Danny points at him, “well you’re not living on the streets. Pretty sure being nomadic in the Mortal Realm is a Hell of a lot harder than here”. Valerie grumbling to the side, “I can’t even argue with that”. Danny nods at her before looking back to Flynn, “plus, you want to get to know your family-”. 

Valerie cutting in, “you just said living with Vlad was dumb. Fuck, _I_ would live here over living with that man”. Flynn rolls his eyes slightly, “I get on well ‘er. Ghosts are ‘ine company. Many edible an they know I know”. Valerie pales a little and blinks at him, “you... eat ghosts”, looking to Danny, “it’s possible to eat ghosts? Healthy?”. 

Danny cringes a little, “not really no. But-”, gesturing at Flynn's eyes, “-guy’s built up an immunity, so _he’s_ fine. He basically has the diet of a ghost that happens to like eating and so thus does it a lot”, shrugging, “which yeah, includes blob ghosts”, smirking meanly, “they're not bad tasting”. 

Flynn nods and grins slightly, “the plump ones are juicy. Skinny have satisfyin’ crunch fire-roasted”. Valerie turns her head and fake gags before looking back, clearly trying and failing to not sound disgusted, “well, Amity has its own natural population of... blobs”, swallowing, “and blebs too, so go right ahead”. Earning chuckling from both boys. 

Danny sighs at Valerie, looking to get back on track, “and Red, I didn’t say for anyone to go live with Vlad. Did you totally miss the whole Maddie’s son part?”. Is he setting this up so that Valerie will ‘take’ Flynn away from him only to return him back to Danny, just human Danny instead? Yes, yes he is. Valerie facepalms, “right yeah, the Fenton’s would be better”. Earning a chuckle from Danny. Flynn gives Danny a very clear ‘you sneaky bastard’ look, which only makes Danny feel smug. Valerie sighing, “and those two would be probably the only people who would hear ‘oh yeah by the way you have a child from another timeline’ and actually believe that and welcome them in right off the bat”. Danny just nods, because yeah his folks were near unfazable when it came to weird shit. 

Flynn nods and hums, “ser ma an Jack”, squinting a little, “an sas an bro, that I didn’ know ‘bout”. Valerie winces in sympathy. 

Danny chuckles, “more like didn’t _have_ until three months ago”. Flynn shrugs. 

Valerie nods, “so you’re going there then”, looking at Phantom, “preferably _now_ ”. 

Danny waves her off nonchalantly, “yeah yeah”, looking to Flynn with a quirked eyebrow, “well?”. Valerie rolls her eyes and crosses her arms at Danny, “he _can’t_ just stay here”. Danny ignores her, partly because the guy can do what he wants, he’s twenty-fucking-four. Having being detached from humanity for fourteen years or not. 

Flynn huffs, “‘ine. An I would like ta see my ma. Others ta, but I don’ know ‘em. Might not remember ma much, but I do”. Valerie frowns softly, “I don’t remember my mom much either”, then throws yet another glare at Danny. Making him roll his eyes and walk off, waving over his shoulder for them to follow; listening to Valerie falling back to walk instep with Flynn -who’s still clearly keeping his distance- and chatting him up. 

“You’ve definitely got Maddie’s hair. Jazz has the same shade”. 

“I know”. 

“Ahh so Phantom’s told you some then, he’s... an okay ghost. For a ghost. How’d the idiot even find you?”. 

Flynn huffs, “some ghosts took issue with my bein’ ‘er, complained ta the ghost that deals with humans a bunch, he showed his head ovar my current sheltar, an we chatted”, whacking Danny’s heel with his staff, “he knows many ghosts, then we flew ‘er”.

Valerie chuckles, “yeah and most want to beat his face in”, sounding more serious, “did these ‘ghosts’ that had issues with you, hurt you or anything”. 

Flynn grunts, “I fight ‘ine. Never saw ‘em any way. Don’ wanna”, scowling, “ _Observants_ ”. 

“I don’t know who the ‘Observants’ are, so the meaning there is lost on me”. 

Danny turns his head around, “think ghost cops or judges. Kinda”. Flynn raises an eyebrow, which is reasonable since Danny was definitely understating the status of the Observants. 

Valerie shakes her head and chuckles a little, “so the cops get up in a tissy about effectively a displaced homeless human and dump their issue on Phantom. I’m not sure if that’s hilarious or sad”. 

Flynn grunts, “errywhere’s my home. Ain’t homeless”. Valerie and Danny decide against commenting on that. Flynn clips open one of his hip bags, pulling out a handful of berries, holding some out to Danny and Valerie, “crimcrim?”. 

Danny chuckles a little and takes one, “sure, none for Red though. Normal humans can’t digest these, man”. Flynn shrugs and pops a few in his mouth. Valerie shakes her head disbelievingly. Though Danny’s now wondering if Flynn’s systems or whatever are completely just adapted to ghost everything and if that means he basically needs it like a ghost does. Sure in Amity, access to ecto-edibles was easy; especially in the Fenton house. And besides, the guy can come back here easy enough and Danny could just bring him ecto-snacks. 

Valerie shakes her head as they enter where Danny’s portal is hanging out, “regular human food is probably going to taste so weird to you”. 

Flynn shrugs with a huff, “I ain’t picky”. 

Danny pats the side of his portal, changing the location it’ll pop Valerie/Flynn out at. Can’t have Valerie falling out of Danny Fenton’s closet and wondering why the fuck the portal sent them there. The Fenton front door was good enough, “yeah I kinda figured that one. Anyway, guess it’s time you get going, though I’m positive I’ll see you sooner rather than later”, and gives a mischievous smile. Flynn squints at him slightly. Eh, better the guy learns he’s a little shit now. 

Valerie rolls her eyes, “if you ask me, you’re more of an all too frequently seen eyesore, Phantom”. Danny grins, “aw you love me”. She scowls at him but nabs a bit of Flynn’s clothes and effectively drags the grunting man through. Leaving Danny shaking his head, patting the portal again to return it back to opening in his closet and hoping through himself. 

Danny doesn’t even get the chance to lay on his bed before Jazz is shouting for him to come downstairs. So he does just that, throwing a very quick cheeky smirk at Flynn standing in the doorway before plastering on a look of confusion and walking over to Jazz, “what you shouting for?”. As if he doesn’t already know. 

Jazz gestures at Flynn and Valerie, who’s fully in suit again, “apparently we have a sibling?”, and sends Danny a very subtle glare. Which of course means she knows Danny knew about this before now. Danny utterly ignores the glare. 

Valerie/Red crosses her arms, “only you Fenton’s would wind up with a half-sibling, whose father is _Vlad_ by the way, from another timeline”. Jazz pinches her nose, “with mom obviously”.

Danny snorts, “do you think Vlad would hook up with _dad_?”. Jazz glares at him very blatantly this time while Valerie grumbles, “I didn’t need that mental image”.

Flynn decides to just walk in and crane his head around. Jazz sighing at the man, “and why does he look like nomad? Can he speak?”.

Flynn looks to her and huffs, “I speak jus ‘ine”, looking around again and poking a table lamp with his staff, “been in the Infinite Realm”. Jazz immediately glares at Danny again, while Valerie nods at Flynn before look back to the two Fenton siblings, “whelp, he’s your problem now”, grumbling a little, “Phantom’s the one who found him so don’t be surprised you get a random visit from the local Spook checking in on him”. Flynn glances at Danny and actually chuckles a little as the front door shuts and the sound of a hoverboard flying off slowly fades into the distance. 

Jazz rounds on Danny, “so _Phantom_ found him, huh?”, and crosses her arms very judgementally at Danny. Danny waves her off, “he knows, Jazz. And-”, holding up a finger, “-timeline tomfuckery. His timeline kinda got deleted so he got thrown into this one”. 

Jazz sighs a little but nods. Her looking to and watching Flynn, “well, welcome then. What do you think? Have you ever lived in a house? During your time the Zone, anyway”. 

Flynn looks away from the kitchen doorway, “no. Caves, hallowed trees, under crags, dried riverbed”, glancing around again, “not ‘ery open”. 

Jazz humming to herself, “makes sense you might find a closed-in building ‘trapping’”. Earning eye-rolling from Danny, “don’t go all psychologist on the guy yet”. She rolls her eyes fondly at him and ruffles his hair quickly; Danny scowling and batting off her hand. 

Flynn smirks at that, “erryone likes messin’ yer hair, shorty”, and promptly ruffles Danny’s hair himself; even if it’s a bit more cautious and awkward. 

Danny snorts, “hey. I’m gonna be, like, seven-foot something when I’m your age!”. Flynn rolls his eyes slightly, “ser ya are”. 

Jazz leans against the kitchen entryway while Flynn wanders around poking stuff with the staff, “how old are you?”. 

“Twenty-four ‘parently”. 

Danny shrugs when Jazz looks to him, “keeping time in the Zone isn’t exactly easy, Jazz. Can’t blame the guy for not knowing”. Humans, unlike ghosts, can’t literally sense their age; even one as ghostly as Flynn apparently is. Jazz looks a little sad but nods understandingly. 

Flynn opens the fridge, turning back to them with a quirked eyebrow and holding up a little bag of vaguely wiggling star-shaped ‘cookies’. Jazz sighing into her hand, “mom’s not the best at cooking or baking”, glaring at a smug-looking Danny a little, “only Danny can actually eat the stuff they ecto-contaminate”. Danny just makes sure to look more smug and snicker a bit when Flynn tears open the bag and takes a bite of one; which Jazz gapes at slightly. 

Flynn shrugs, “not bad, made bettar”. Jazz shakes her head, “I guess you would have to cook with ecto in the Zone. Fair warning, mom and dad are definitely going to pick your brain about that”. Danny sticks up a finger, “not literally pick you brain though”. 

Flynn huffs, “Jack’s not my pa”, sticking the ‘cookies’ back into the fridge, “but I like makin’ food. Mostly stews tho”, rolling his eyes and huffing at Danny, “an I don’ think ya’d even let me ‘er if ya thought they’d actually go messin’ wit my brain. Ya protective, shorty”. 

Jazz giggles at Danny slightly before nodding at Flynn, “yeah, our dad would be more like your step-dad or even uncle maybe”. Danny shrugs, “Vlad’s uncle or godfather, depending on how much I vaguely hate him at the time”. 

Flynn grunts, “er just Jack. No extra titles”. Jazz sighs a bit sadly, “Jack’s a family guy, even if you beg him he’ll probably still call you ‘son’”, shaking her head a little, “you’ll hurt his feelings if you just call him ‘Jack’”. 

Danny chuckles with a nod, “yup, and he’ll probably call you ‘son’ _very_ enthusiastically”, chuckling some more, “we only call him ‘Jack’ when he’s really messed something up”, shrugging, “or I’m in ghost form”. Which yes fine, calling his dad ‘Jack’ all the time was kinda cool. Weird and almost felt like some kind of sin sometimes but still pretty darn cool. 

Jazz glares at the ceiling, “like when he locked me and mom in the weapons vault because he forgot to install a handle”.

Danny points at her, “or the three times he’s sucked the house into the Zone”. Jazz cringes. 

Flynn chuckles slightly, “land it on any one?”. 

Danny shakes his head looking disappointed, “not a one, talk about a wasted opportunity”. Jazz rolls her eyes at the two boys then looking to the clock and back, “anyway, feel up for the tour before any parents get back?”.

Flynn glances around before giving a nod, “were they at?”.

Danny shrugs and waves over his shoulder for the guy to follow, “convention -a gathering of people with some kind of similar interest- a town over”. Jazz quickly moving near Danny, looking to Flynn though, “how about bedrooms first? Probably should let mom show you the lab”. Danny snorts, “not Jack, he’ll blow something up probably”.

Flynn shrugs as they walk upstairs, “used ta explosions”. Jazz looks just slightly confused, “you are?”. Danny rolls his eyes, “it’s the _Ghost Zone_ , Jazz. _Of course there are explosions_ ”, smirking at her as he pushes his bedroom door open, “what would make you think there wasn’t just tons of shit getting blown up all the time”. Jazz glares slightly, “not everyone here is super familiar with the land of the dead, Danny”. 

Flynn smirks and chuckles to himself slightly, glancing around the little room, “can tell a ghost’s set up ‘er”, glancing at Danny, “feels like ya ta”. Danny blushes a little and rubs his neck, shrugging slightly awkwardly, “hey, it’s not like I can help leaving my ecto-signature on things”, grumbling, “especially considering how often I get my ectoplasm on the floor and shit in here”.

Jazz flicks his ear, “that wouldn’t happen so much if you learned to dodge”. Danny shoves her out his door. 

Flynn prods one of Danny’s model rocket ships with his staff enough to make it wiggle and looks up at the ceiling, “what is this?”, pointing at the ceiling, “looks kinda like fake hard ectoplasm”. 

Danny blinks and goes a bit wide-eyed, “do you not remember _stars_?!?”, gesturing his hand around at the ceiling, “not made with fake ecto. It’s a glow-in-the-dark plastic”, gesturing more but dismissively, “ignore that. Back to the ‘you don’t know stars’ thing”. 

Flynn smirks slightly, “tha white dots at night in the Human Realm? Jus spots”. Danny open mouth screeches at the ceiling. Flynn actually snickers now, Danny’s positive the guy’s fucking with him a little now; which really only encourages Danny’s screeching to continue. 

Jazz smacks a hand over Danny’s mouth, looking to the amused Flynn, “this doesn’t weird you out?”. Flynn shrugs and grunts, “normal ghost thing”. Danny nips Jazz’s hand, her jerking away and scowling at him; stalking off to her room, both boys in tow and chuckling to themselves. 

Flynn pokes a stack of books on the floor, “‘ore books than I’ve evar seen”. Jazz looks more than a little pained over that; Danny just cackles exaggeratedly. Danny continues said cackling when Flynn nudges open one cover and just shrugs slightly quizzically at the pages, making Jazz whisper, “oh Zone, he _can’t read”._

Flynn huffs at her with a squint, “I can well enough”. Jazz just looks more pained at that. 

The three just stick their heads into the parents master bedroom, Danny’s not about to actually go in; talk about weird. All Flynn’s got to say is to squint at the large indent on one side of the large bed, “Jack’s biggar than thought”. Danny and Jazz both laugh over that a little, because yeah his dad was a giant of a man. Danny seriously hopes he grows to his own tall ass height really suddenly and like almost entirely over summer break. Purely so he can startle the shit out of people -Dash- when he returned to school. That would be so priceless. 

Jazz looks even more pained yet again when they make their way to the bathroom, as Flynn pokes and looks at toothbrushes and hair products like they’re completely foreign. Her grumbling, “alright, clearly one of the first orders of business is getting some personal hygiene habits forming. Starting with a good shower”. 

Danny chuckles with a head shake, walking over to the little cupboard. Pulling out and holding out a little bottle to the guy, “that stuff’s good body wash for those of us with lots of cuts, bruises, and scars”. Jazz hands Flynn a bottle or two herself, “these are good for long hair and redheads”. 

Flynn just nods and eyes the stuff cautiously. Danny points at him, “you should totally update from matted to dreaded. That’d look fucking wicked on you”. Jazz nods a little, “and it would be more similar to what you’re used to”. Flynn just shrugs. 

By the time they’re walking down the steps back to the living room the front door opens. Danny watching his mom walk through and immediately realising he probably should have, like, _called_ or something. Given a heads up? Because ‘surprise child!’ wasn’t the greatest idea. But fuck it, that’s what’s happening. Too late now. 

Maddie wipes of her jumpsuit boots on the floor mat, “Danny! Jazz! We’re-oh!”, she jumps slightly at noticing them half way down the stairs, “guess we caught you just in time”, and smiles, then pausing at spotting Flynn. Her tilting her head at the man who’s just sorta staring at her a bit wide-eyed, “oh? Who’s this?”, looking to Danny and Jazz, “I didn’t know you had a guest over?”. 

Flynn chokes a little and stays firmly planted on the stairs. Jazz eyeing him with worry all the while. 

Danny glances at Flynn before moving quickly down the steps. Alright Danny motherfucking Phantom/Fenton, time to practice those mediating skills. Attempt to explain this crap before his dad bardges in or either of them notice the whole ‘this strange man has a staff tipped with solid ectoplasm, clothing made out of ghost hides and ecto-plant matter, ecto-ice knife, and the _green fucking eyes’_ situation. “Alright, hear me out”, gesturing behind him at Flynn, “meet your third child who’s from another timeline. Surprise?”. Now note, Danny’s ‘skill’ at mediating is the skill to cause chaos and/or anger the Observants or other dickish ghosts. 

Maddie blinks, “what?”, furrowing her eyebrows, “Danny sweetie, what are you talking about?”. 

Danny shrugs stiffly, “exactly what I said. Surprise child”. 

Jazz sighs, whispering to Flynn, “you alright?”, he nods stiffly so she walks down the steps a little, still blocking Maddie’s complete view of the man, “apparently he was abducted by a ghost into the Zone before his timeline got erased and Phantom found him”. 

Danny looks back to her and nods, looking back to his mom, “and Red went and got him. Brought him here”, grinning, “his name’s Flynn”. 

Maddie looks from Jazz to Danny and blinks, looking to Flynn’s wide-eyed face. Clearly she’s assessing him, giving him a good once over. Her face softening, “oh, you have-”, only to get interrupted by Jack. 

Jack barges in, “did I hear that right!?!”. The sudden loud entrance making Flynn flinch, take a fighting stance, and almost aggressively point his staff at Jack. This does absolutely nothing to deter the large ghost hunter, who just gets more excited, “is that tipped with pure ectoplasm!?!?”, and practically rushing Flynn; who unsurprisingly tightens his grip and takes a few steps back up the stairs. 

Jazz and Danny immediately moving to block Jack, “Dad! Wait!”. Jack looks like a kicked puppy. Jazz making him meet her eyes, “he’s a little bit skittish, dad”.

Danny nodding, throwing a reassuring smile at Flynn before looking back to his dad, “he’s not exactly used to humans”, smirking, “you’re kinda big, dad”. That gets a hearty chuckle out of the man; and Danny can practically hear Flynn relaxing his grip on his staff slightly. Though Danny’s not really surprised that his dad didn’t even question the ‘surprise child’ thing. He is a teensy but miffed that his dad accepted Flynn before alternate timeline Dad accepted Danny; guess he didn’t think ‘Flynn’ was a stupid name. 

Maddie walks up slowly and pats Jack’s back, “calm down, Hun. You can probably pepper him with questions later”. Jack looks slightly dejected for a second before perking back up, grinning at Flynn and giving him a strong nod, “hope you’re up for that!”. 

Flynn squints at him, “... yer like grappling willows wit somethin’ shiny”. Danny snorts at that and coughs to attempt to cover it up. Flynn goes back to staring at Maddie. 

Maddie blinks before smiling up st Flynn, “you’ve got my father’s voice, your grandfathers”. Flynn relaxes out of the battle stance slowly, “... don’ remember ‘im”. 

Danny looks back to the guy and shrugs, “me and Jazz haven’t even met him, so that’s not surprising, man”. Flynn glances to him then back to Maddie. 

Jazz nods to herself and starts pushing Jack lightly, “how about we move into the living room and sit down. Have a talk”, looking back to Flynn, “and Flynn can come down and join us when he feels comfortable”. Flynn eyes her and nods, grunting a little. 

Thankfully Jack goes to the couch without much prompting, Maddie throwing Flynn another smile before joining her husband. Jazz puts her hands on her hips and mutters at Danny with a glare, “for a king you’re pretty bad at de-escalation, Danny”. Danny just smirks as the siblings move to sit down in the living room as well. Flynn poking his head over the railing and just sort of observing. Or in Danny’s humble -but experienced- opinion: doing threat assessment. 

Danny clears his throat, “so basically”, looking to his mom, “you married Vlad instead of dad”, Danny feels very smug over the disgusted look on her face and, by the Ancients, does he ever want to glance at Flynn to see the guy’s reaction. Totally not the best idea to do though. His dad tilting his head and saying, “I could see it!”, chuckling, “if I wasn’t in the picture anyway”, and kissing Maddie’s cheek; makes Danny choke though. Danny has to seriously resist muttering ‘what the fuck dad’ at that. His mom looks pretty confused, and still grossed-out, at least. 

Jazz quirks an eyebrow, “really?”. 

Jack beams, “well if she’s couldn't be with me I wouldn’t want her to just stay alone her whole life!”, nodding to himself strongly, “I’d rather her be happy no matter who she’s with”. 

Maddie grins wide and kisses his cheek right back, “awww, Hun. I love you too”, grumbling a little, “you’re the only man for me though”. Danny turns to the side and gags. He can hear Flynn mutter, “dif from pa. Very. Ma loves ‘im tho”.

Maddie readjusts, looking back to her two children, or the two she knew about anyway. “So I understand how Flynn could have wound up in this timeline”, chuckling a little, “normal rules of the universe don’t exactly apply there. But-”, pursing her lips, “-how long has he been there? And, not to sound accusing, but are you two sure? The Red Huntress?”. 

Jack grumbles, “wouldn’t put it past some Spook to pose as a human and try to sneak into the Fenton home”. 

Jazz crosses her arms and leans back, “I’d say it’s certain he’s human, an isolated one but still human”. 

Danny nods at her before looking back to his folks, “I agree. And fourteen years apparently. He’s twenty-four”. 

Jack blinks, looking more than a little excited, “how’d he even survive?!? Such a hostile environment! We haven’t even gone in since it being completely toxic was almost absolutely certain!”; he seems utterly amazed and is clearly struggling to not just run up and examine Flynn. 

Maddie taps her chin and mutters into her hand, “not to mention what did he eat and drink? I’m amazed the air’s even breathable”. Danny bites his tongue to keep from commenting that Flynn just ate the same shit as ghosts do. Danny Fenton shouldn’t know ghosts even eat, since his folks (and nearly all of Amity for that matter) didn’t believe they did. 

Danny rubs his neck, “well based on the staff slash spear, I’d say him hunting is an obvious answer”. Not surprised in the slightest that Maddie mutters, “but hunts what?”. Jack chuckles and is clearly making something of a joke, “who knows! Maybe he ate ghosts! Imagine that!”, and laughs with a large smile. 

Flynn picks that moment to come down a few steps, still staying on the staircase though. Digging in one of his pouches and pulling out a crude shish kabob of some blob ghost chunks and berries, having apparently taken Jack seriously, “crunchy ones are good wit yewdew berries”, shrugging slightly, “I’d offar ya but Phantom said I’m ‘ine ‘cause I got tolerance”. Danny seriously can’t help laughing into his hand when everyone else turns and raises their eyebrows at Flynn. 

Flynn grunts, definitely picking up that he’s being judged and that everyone, excluding Danny, are in utter disbelief, “there plenty ‘ine plants an blobs an blebs. Can’ eat Whisps tho”, grumbling, “like bittin’ soggy air”, grunting at the continued staring, “ghosts eat the same, ain’t tha odd”. 

Danny wheezes, “for a human? Yes, yes it is”. Flynn squints at him and scowls, stepping just close enough to be able to jab Danny with his staff. 

Jack whispers, “ghosts eat???”. Flynn squints at him and gives him a weird look, “ _yes_ ”, sounding like this should be incredibly obvious. Looks like Flynn’s get one Hell of an intro into ectophobia and how human supremacy was a legit and highly practiced thing amongst the living.

Maddie stands up slowly and holds her hand out, gesturing gently at the shish kabob, “may I?”. Flynn glances at the food before handing it over, eyeballing her all the while. Maddie twists it over in her fingers in amazement, then looking over Flynn’s body, “your clothing, you made it yourself?”.

Flynn nods, “live off tha land”, grinning slightly, “tha fightin’ an survivin’ teachin’ ya gave me prob’ saved me”. 

Jack stands and comes a little closer, though not too close at Jazz’s glaring. “I’m guessing I wasn’t involved in your life huh?“.

Flynn eyes him and shakes his head, “naw, was told lab accident in college”. Both parents go wide-eyed, Maddie whispering sadly, “the one that happened to Vlad”. Earning a small nod from Flynn. 

Maddie shakes her head a little to herself then smiles at Flynn, “that settles it then, welcome to the family Flynn”, sighing a little, “I’m guessing you’d like to see and talk to Vlad too though?”.

Flynn nods, “family’s family”, eyeing Danny, “been told he’s a lil’ different tho”.

Jack laughs loudly, “I’m sure your Vlad’s just as good a man as ours!”; which Danny cringes over. Jazz and Maddie both scowl. Flynn thankfully keeps his mouth shut. Jack claps his hands, “I’ll go call him!”. 

Danny practically bolts off the couch, “oh no I can do that!”, waving his parents off, “you guys should just get to know each other”, and grins. Danny’s positive Flynn’s the only one that notices that grin becoming mischievous and mildly malicious after his folks turn away. Jazz continues to mediate, proper mediating, while Danny slinks off into the kitchen. 

Danny snickers as he dails away, time to mildly fuck with a frootloop. Snickering to himself before the man picks up. 

_“To what do I owe this honour, Daniel. Renounced your father yet?”. Danny can feel the sarcasm there._

Danny snorts, “hardly, uncle vampy. You’re never gonna upgrade to being my dad, but I am here to tell you you’re a father. Surprise!”. 

Danny can hear and practically feel the eyeroll, _“I’m hardly related to that girl, and last I checked she was **your** child. As inane as that is”. _

“Only got yourself to blame, old man. But I’m not talking about my lovable little gumdrop. Oh no”, Danny can’t help a grin splitting his face, “no, I’m talking about Flynn”, leaning against a wall and inspecting his nails, “you know, the kid you had with mom and just left to wander the Zone as a nomad for fourteen years”. 

Danny feels ridiculously smug over hearing Vlad choke over the line. The nutcase speaking up after clearly composing himself, _“what are you playing at, boy”._ Oh now that was definitely a threat.

Danny shrugs, “alternate timelines are weird like that”, waving his hand around in the air, “now now, no need to thank me. Seeing as my timeline screwing around caused this. On that note, betcha never saw a random son as a possible consequence for giving my friends ecto-acne, you fucking psychopath”. 

_“I’m going to murder you”._

Danny snorts, “yeah have fun with that”, chuckling, “you know, if you don’t hurry on over your _dear old friend Jack_ is gonna do even more overeager parental bonding in your place”. 

Vlad hangs up. 

Danny blinks down at his phone. Is that a ‘yes’? Or is that a ‘fuck off’? Ah Hell now that assholes gonna make him call again just to make sure. Fucking doucheknuckle. Needless to say Danny dails again. Least the prick picks up immediately. 

Danny sighs, “look you crazy old man, I’m not messing with you for a change. The man’s got your chin and Jazz’s hair. Trust me, you’re related”.

_“I’m going to murder you_ “, sighing, _“do you have any proof. Say... a picture with Maddie”._

Danny pulls the phone away from his cheek and glares at it. Putting it back to his ear, “you are such a fucking creep. I was there. The image of mom happily leaning in for a kiss from you is forever burned into my brain. Now get your butt over here”, eyeing his mom as she walks in making a beeline for the fridge, disappearing back into the living room with more than a few containers of various accidentally ecto-food, “preferably before mom accidentally poisons the guy with ecto-contaminated food”, and cringes. Though the guy probably _couldn’t_ get poisoned by ecto-food. Maybe. Hopefully. 

_“If this is a prank, Daniel. You’ll wish the entire Fenton lineage never existed. Excluding dear Maddie of course”_ , and hangs up. 

Danny pulls the phone away from his face, looks at it, and chuckles with a head shake. He’ll give vampy ass half an hour tops before he shows up at their front door. In the meantime, time to head back into the living room to watch his parents lose their collective shit over his half-brother. 

Danny walks in to Flynn nibbling on a bit of ecto-steak while scowling and pointing at what was supposed to be brownies, “tha no good”. His mom looks only slightly disappointed and at least Flynn is actually sitting on a chair now; though it’s clear he’s sitting in a way that would make it very easy to bolt up and go on the attack if need be. 

Jazz sighs and shakes her head, “he’s not an experiment, guys”. They both have the decency to look a little sheepish. Maddie nodding a little, “we’re scientists, honey, and this is unheard of”, looking to Flynn, “though we’re not making you uncomfortable are we?”.

Flynn huffs, “‘ine. Ain’t gonn’ object ta free food”, which just reminds Danny, and probably everyone else, that Flynn had to seriously work for his meals. Jack chuckles, “well parents are supposed to give their kids food! So it’s not really free!”. 

Flynn squints, “yer not my pa”. And yup, Jack immediately looks more than a little wounded, but he does recover real quick, “I’d say you are! A kid of my wife’s a kid of my own!”. 

“Tha’s not how tha works”. 

Danny sighs humorously, the guy’s kidding himself if he thinks he’s getting out of this, “just accept it, man. At least be cool with step-pa”, blinking and grinning at coming upon an idea, trying to speak quiet enough to be ignored as his mom gets up to put away the food containers and his dad’s off in his own head probably trying to think of ways to get Flynn to accept him, “or standing pa. There is a difference between standing and granted, you know”. Flynn grunts but furrows his eyebrows, clearly he’s at least considering this. 

His mom comes back in and taps her chin, looking to Jazz, “you two have shown him around some, right? Though I'm sure we could reorganise the storage room to be a third bedroom”, looking to Flynn, “if he wants to stay here anyway”. Jazz immediately blurting out, “oh he’s staying. He will not be becoming homeless, here or in the Zone”. Maddie laughs, “well he definitely can’t stay with the ghosts, Jazz honey, obviously”. 

Danny glares at Jazz a little, “jeez you could stop trying to make people’s decisions for them, gosh”. Flynn just grunts, “ghosts are ‘ine company”; earning weird looks from Jack and Maddie, like they weren’t sure if they should comment on that. Regardless Maddie speaks up again, “and I’m pretty sure the kids didn’t show you the lab”, and giving both Danny and Jazz meaningful looks; the ‘you better not have brought a stranger unfamiliar with our lab safety down into the lab’ message is very obvious. 

While Danny puts his hands up in mock surrender, Jazz smiles gently at mom, “of course not, mom. We know better than that”, and then sends Danny a very judgmental glare. It’s understandable, considering ignoring that rule is part of what got him half offed. 

His dad bolts up, “yes! To the lab!”, making Flynn twitch and jerk the staff at the large man slightly; not that Jack notices in his haste to get to the lab door. Flynn glances to Danny almost questioningly, Danny’s got a feeling the guy is going to be looking to him a lot for confirmation of if human stuff is ‘safe’ or ‘alright’. It makes sense, Danny was a ghost/human familiar with the world of ghosts, but also was a human/ghost familiar with the human world. Flynn was, for all accounts and purposes, more so a ghost with a human body than a proper human being. Danny walks to the lab door and waves for the guy to follow, Jazz following suit herself. Maddie just chuckles and shakes her head as she heads down the steps, watching Flynn stand up and walking more so closer to Danny, “brothers already”, and smiles. 

Jack looks like an excited puppy as Flynn walks around poking stuff with the base of his staff; Maddie moving to quickly clean up anything that may react to the whole ‘ectoplasm on a stick’ thing not to mention the ecto-clothing. Flynn grunts, “messy”. Making Jack laugh, “that’s inventing for you! It’s a messy process!”. Flynn tilts his head and nods slightly; which Danny gets since the guy effectively invented a bunch of shit himself. 

Danny can’t help grinning to himself when his dad bolts off to pick up a prototype jet pack thing and starts showing it off to Flynn, “since the Zone’s got no gravity -which I guess you already know!- we make things that can hover so we could get around the place once we decided to go in!”, gesturing grandly to the Spector Speeder, “the Speeder over there is a bit bulky so we wanted to make something for one person use too!”, holding up the prototype jet back more, “it’s only a prototype for now though”.

Flynn pokes it with his stick, quirks an eyebrow, and chuckles slightly before moving to fiddle with his Minotaur hide shawl causing the phoenix feather cape/glider to fall out, “‘ready made my own. Can’ fly like ghosts, ser made my own way”. Jack borderline has literal sparkles in his eyes. 

Maddie grins and beams at him a little, walking somewhat closer though minding his personal space, “no surprise you’re an inventor, all of us, even Vlad, have a knack for inventing”, eyeing the cape/glider, “how does that work though. It appears to just be feathers”.

Flynn huffs, “an it is. Phoenix”. Maddie and Jack just blink at him, obviously not getting it. Flynn huffs again and looks back to Danny, who shrugs because he can’t really answer for the guy here. Flynn glares at him before looking back to the two adults, “Phoenix fire birds. Fire Cored. Feathars radiate heat makin’ pocket o’ hot air an hot air rise ser ya stay airborne. Ya glide”, stomping his staff on the ground some before the chunk of ectoplasm is just _on fire_ , “can also make fire. Shoot fire”, the staffs flame dies out. Danny is impressed.

Danny’s not too sure how to feel about the very envious and wanting look his mom gives the feathers though. There’s kinda a reason Danny doesn’t even attempt to teach them ghost stuff, besides just not wanting to be suspicious; that reason being the fact that his folks might use that knowledge to harm ghosts or the Zone itself. Maddie eyes the feathers on the staff, “are they hard to get? These feathers”. 

Flynn actually squints, apparently as suspicious of her motives as Danny, “if ya don’ try takin’ ‘em right off the birds, ya. An if know where they lair is”, squinting more when she looks excited and like she’s about to ask for the location, “they’re rare. Dyin’ out. If ya don’ need ‘em, then leave ‘em. Don’ take whatcha don’ need”, gesturing his staff at the jet pack thing, “jus work heat stuff inta tha”. 

Maddie looks to be contemplating that but like she’s also a little confused and concerned by Flynn’s philosophy. Jack taps his chin and sounds genuinely confused though, “what’s it matter? The less ghosts the better. An extinct ghost is a good ghost”. 

Flynn squints more and _actually whacks Jack one with his staff_ , “moron”. Maddie goes a little wide-eyed along with Jazz, and Jack puts a hand on his head looking startled. Flynn huffs almost angrily, turning to look at Danny and squinting more, “... Phantom’s right. Don’ like ghosts. Don’ know ghosts. Ridiculous”. And looks back to the two adults, glaring all the while, “no. Bad. Fight don’ destroy, unless fer survivin’. Same wit humans an mortal animals. No different”. 

Jack and Maddie both squint at him while Danny and Jazz are just staying out of this, though Danny’s tickled green that his folks might actually listen to someone whose been _living with ghosts almost longer than Danny’s been alive_. Maddie purses her lips, “but getting rid of all of them _is_ survival, lest they destroy us and the living world. That’s all they want after all”. 

Flynn squint glares even more, looking more than a little bit unimpressed and slightly befuddled, “ego. If tha were true woulda ‘ready happened. Nephitius could show an take away yer gravity, most ya would die then. Misery Vex ta, could beset ya with plagues of locusts an rot. No more crops. Ya die there ta. If ghosts wanted Mortal Realm destroyed, they’d have it”. Which just firmly reminds Danny that he needs to scour that stupid huge book to find out about this bloody ghost who’s probably old as shit. Flynn huffs, “an Misery Vex took me ‘cause she _likes_ mortals. Many do”. Now that gives Danny a suspicious feeling that gives him a slight idea where, exactly, he should begin looking for info.

Jazz takes that moment to interject, stepping forward a little bit to draw attention towards herself, “it does really only makes sense”, holding up a finger and sounding a little high and mighty, “an entire sentient species being malicious emotionless evil just doesn’t seem logical in the slightest”. 

Maddie blinks while Jack hums, looking to Flynn, “well, uh, did this ‘Misery Vex’ say _why_ she likes humans? Could be evil reasons”. Danny glares at his dad, couldn’t they just give this shit a freaking chance? Like, seriously. He thinks it’s pretty fucking reasonable to assume Flynn knows ghost behaviour better than literally any other human ever. Danny and Vlad included; they may be ghosts, partly, but they didn’t live amongst ghosts. 

Flynn rolls his eyes, “somethin’ ‘bout wantin’ strong life, I didn’ stick ‘round. I was ten, and she was a spider creature”. Both parents shake their heads looking confused and amazed. 

Maddie shakes her head again, plastering on a smile, “well I guess you must have learned a lot, living around ghosts. We’ll have to pick your brain about them some time”; Flynn just huffs. Jack seems to grab this a conversational life raft away from the apparently touchy and complicated subject of ethics regarding ghosts and the ideals human supremacy, “speaking of picking your brain, any other little inventions you’ve made?”. Danny rolls his eyes at the avoidance tactic; they’re gonna haveta face their own bullshit someday and that someday is probably fast approaching. 

Flynn taps his staff on the ground, “‘sides this, carved ecto-ice knife, food sticks, flint crackers”, the guy actually clicks his teeth in a way that makes flames spit out of the sides of his mouth; whelp, that’s one way to make up for a lack of a lighter or matches. Maddie jerks and Jack actually jumps with a laugh, making Flynn chuckle some. Danny bets that his dad would actively try inspecting Flynn’s teeth if Flynn wouldn’t obviously push him off with his staff. “Bela stone, useful stuff”. 

Jack looks to Maddie excitedly, “we so need some of that”. Though Danny doesn’t really _want_ his folks running around the Zone to get some, that could cause more than a fair few issues. 

Jazz hums, “well maybe go write down some ideas and pester him later, this has nothing to do with him being family”, and nods to herself. Surprisingly the couple actually listens to her and give Flynn somewhat sheepish looks; Flynn shakes his head almost disbelievingly but also slightly amused.

Danny leans over to Flynn, “you’re going to hear a lot more like that being here”, as his parents rush off to write little notes for the jet back and who knows what other new ideas Flynn just effectively gave them. Danny then gestures with ridiculous jazz hands at the portal while whispering, “but also, what do ya think about my grave? Grand ain’t it?”, and grins. Flynn looks at him slightly judgingly and huffs, “ya less bothared than most”. Danny doesn’t get a chance to respond to that -because yeah, Danny was less bothered about people messing with or crossing his grave than most ghosts- as there’s a knock on the front door. 

Danny would bet his life savings that that’s Vlad. Ancients, he’d take off his ghost jumpsuit and eat his ghost underwear if it’s not Vlad.


	5. From Rags To Riches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vlad shows his face, queue a lot of snark and an exasperated Flynn.

Danny turns to the lab stairway, “I’ll get it”, glancing at everyone as he starts heading up, “I’ll holler if it’s Vladdie!”. His dad gives an excited double thumbs up. 

Sticking his head around the kitchen entryway into the living room confirms that it is indeed Vlad, in his pompous ass suit and now staring at him looking extremely supremely unimpressed. Danny snickers at him before walking into the living room proper, sticking his hands in his pockets, “sup, vampy. Come to see your brat? He’s twenty-four by the way so don’t bother trying to groom him into your prime villain protege or anything. Also-”, snicker, “-he doesn’t how to _read_ , so there’s that”. 

Vlad glares, “you must be joking”. Making Danny snort, “I fucking wish actually, he doesn’t know what a cellphone is. What twenty-something doesn’t know fucking _cellphones_? He’s probably never seen a _meme_ before. _The horror_ ”. Vlad rolls his eyes as he steps in, “yes, that is certainly the biggest issue with that problem. I’m sure”.

Danny gives a very cheeky, “yup”, before turning his head to shout towards the lab door, “HEY YO FLYNN! IT’S VLADDIE! GET UP AND GREET YOUR POMPOUS-PAPPIE”. Turning to look back to Vlad, who has decided to grace him with a flash of his red ‘scary eyes’. Oh how rare and bless-ed he must be today to get a glimpse of those ruby reds. Note: he was being sarcastic as fuck there, green eyes are _way_ better anyway. So there. 

Flynn steps only halfway out from the doorway, leaving half of himself hidden but making his staff absolutely fully visible and just stares at Vlad. It’s actually vaguely creepy. 

Vlad stares back. 

And Danny just looks rapidly back and forth between them. “Whelp, this is just a touch awkward”. 

Flynn huffs and continues staring. 

Danny pulls out his phone and waves it around, “these things come with a timer, you know. So I can totally just start that up and you two can make this dick measuring contest genuine”, pointing at both of them, “or we can talk like good little adults”. Flynn glances at him, “shorty”; making Vlad smirk at Danny’s expense. Danny frowns in fake offence, “hey”. But at least that gets Vlad to tug on his suit jacket to straighten it and step forward to actually greet Flynn, so hey, it’s something. 

Sure Vlad’s form of ‘greeting’ is looking the half of Flynn that he can actually see over and giving a snide, “well at least you’ve got some build on you”. Which Danny rolls his eyes and crosses his arms over, “wow, way to be a dick, frootloop”. Vlad side-eyes him, “I’m still debating your demise”. Danny throws back a very apathetic and unaffected, “mmm okay”. Resulting in him having to dodge a very half-hearted swipe from the man and bounce out of Vlad's easy arm reach, “gotta be quicker on your toes, old man”, smirking, “what? that old age catchin’ up to ya?”, vaguely dancing over to Flynn and grabbing his Minotaur shawl thing, yanking him fully into the kitchen, “and get fully in here you, and face your maker”. 

Flynn glares and huffs at him. Expected. Half the sounds the guy makes seem to involve either huffing or grunting. Wonderful sign of some serious lack of socialisation right there. Vlad’s rich asshole circles are going to _love_ him so fucking much. Just like how they love Danny. Once again, note the generous helping of sarcasm he is mentally pilling on there. 

Turning to look at Vlad and holding out the photo of alternate Vlad with alternate Maddie, “anyway, proof ‘cause I know you just love that stick that you’ve shoved so far up your ass you might as well be a popsicle”. Vlad leans forward, inspecting, and blinks vaguely disbelievingly. Danny rolls his eyes at the man not touching the photo, “let me guess, this has been in my pocket and is thus too dirty for you to sully your hands with?”. Vlad nods at him quickly with a smug smirk before straightening back up, “though the atrocity that I’m wearing in that deserves to be surrounded by the filth that fills your pockets”. 

Flynn blinks, “yah, yer rivals. Tho figured ya’d be evenly matched”, looking to Danny -though Danny’s pretty sure this guy is trying to just play off the whole ‘meeting my dad for the first time in fourteen years and instead of being a dad the guy shit talks my half-brother’- Flynn points at Vlad while speaking at Danny, “ya could end ‘im. Don’ end my pa tho”. 

Danny sputters and bends over wheezing while Vlad looks offended, “hear that vampy?!? He’s saying you’re weak!”. 

Flynn instantly jumps to his defence, “‘s not that he’s weak. Ya’re jus... excessive”. Making Danny snicker, “can’t argue that”, because yeah Danny knows he’s over-fucking-powered. That’s kinda what happens when you’re the literal King of the entire Realm of the dead and all the ghosts therein. Regardless Danny keeps laughing and slaps his knee repeatedly. Which Vlad scoffs at, “get ahold of yourself, my boy”. 

Danny can hear the raised eyebrow in Flynn’s voice, “‘my boy’?”. Danny looks up as Vlad huffs at Flynn, “yes I guess it would be rather rude of me to be calling Daniel that with you here”. Danny snorts, “like you care about rude, Mr. Plots Others Demise Directly In Front Of Their Faces”. Vlad waves a dismissive hand at Danny, “their intellect and worth is beneath me to care. Family has at least earned some level of attention from me. You should know that by now”. 

“Still not your son”. 

Flynn grunts, “an I am. Ya might be ‘ore stuck up than my ya”, then Flynn smirks and Danny has a feeling the guy is gonna say something that’ll piss Vlad off, “makes sense wit name like _Plasmius_ ”. Oh yeah, Vlad’s gonna be mad. 

Vlad snaps his angry red eyes on Danny, sounding more than just slightly violently angry, **_“you told him_** ”. Danny just bends over further and wheezes. Flynn pokes Vlad’s chest aggressively with the tip of his staff, “back back, no fightin’ in food room place”. Danny just wheezes more at that, “Ancients, it’s called a _kitchen_ , man. Oh Zone”. Flynn grunts, glares, and removes his staff from Vlad’s chest to smack Danny over the head with it. “Ow”. Sure that didn’t actually hurt but it’s the point of the matter. 

He can hear Flynn’s scowl, while the guy looks back to Vlad, “an ‘sides, I’d know what ya are any way”, gesturing the staff tip around Vlad’s body while Vlad quirks an eyebrow at him, clearly more curious about Flynn than pissed at Danny. “Can sense it ‘round ya an smell it on ya’s clothes. Yain’t all human. ‘Ore human than tha red one wit her suit on tho”. 

Danny straightens up and brushes off his pants, snickering, “yeah he knows about Valerie too, surprise knowledge. Did you not notice his glowing green ass eyes?”. Watching Vlad squint and hum at Flynn, who just sits and lets Vlad stare at and analyse his eyes, “hmmm so you can see my ecto-field then?”. Flynn shrugs, “‘ore er less”. Danny chuckles, “you could say that that ‘bout sums it up”. Flynn looks to him and squints, “not addin’ anythin’”. Making Danny facepalm, “it’s another saying, man”. And Vlad actually has to turn to the side and sigh into his hand, it looks like the man is having a very hard time not insulting Flynn repeatedly and in ever-increasingly deeming ways; huh, guess he was willing to actually try to not be a complete and utter dick to his own son. That earns him a few points in the ‘not the definition of evil’ category. 

Vlad looks back after a steadying breath, “be that as it may, I’d rather you not divulge my ghostly status to anyone. Flynn was it?”. Flynn squints, “that’s my name, ya”, looking to the side and huffing, though not letting Vlad out of his sights, “an I won’”, looking fully back to Vlad and sighing before just slowly poking the man with a finger. Both Danny and Vlad elect to merely watch and see what this previously non-existent Zone nomad will do next; Danny’s just glad his folks stayed downstairs or this entire meeting would be a bajillion times awkwarder. Danny wouldn’t be able to make such blatant jabs at Vlad, Flynn wouldn’t be able to discuss anyone’s ghostliness, Vlad wouldn’t be able to even be in the ballpark of honest. 

Flynn pokes Vlad again, muttering, “yer real”. Alright, okay, the whole ‘here’s your father’ thing might have just hit the guy properly now. Vlad tilts his head ever so slightly, “indeed”; and Danny suddenly feels like he’s intruding on a very personal and private moment or something. 

This is too much for Danny. Danny shoots both his arms out to the side and smacks both of the men on the back to smush them together, “ugh! Just hug already goddamnit!”. Both Vlad and Flynn sputter and cough, screwing up their faces; but they immediately separate and effectively turn their backs on each other.

“Don’ do ‘hugs’”.

“Neither do I for that matter”. 

Danny practically growls, “oh for fucks sake”, and just telekinetically maneuvers them into forcibly embracing each other: which predictably and obviously gets him a pink ecto-beam straight to the face hard enough to send him crashing out the kitchen window immediately after he cuts it out. Flynn also pelts him with a rock, but that’s not exactly something that would cause Danny any notable kind of damage; though he is kinda curious where the rock came from.

At least they fucking hugged. Mission accomplished.

He can hear Vlad huff, “anyway. Now that Daniel’s finished being his insufferable self, I imagine you rather need legal documents. Since I doubt you exist in the legal system”. Flynn just huffs so Vlad continues, “right then”. Danny can’t help snickering to himself as he lies in a pile of rubble and some bushes when Vlad speaks up again actually sounding ever so slightly befuddled, “it would seem you already do”.

Flynn sounds slightly more befuddled, “what”. So Danny takes that as his queue to crawl back in through the shattered window, “oh yeah, blame Tuck. Dude probably preempted what I would have eventually asked him to do and just did it before I asked him to”, grinning smugly at the two men, “yeah my friends are awesome like that”, looking to Vlad specifically, “sure is nice to have genuine friends, eh Vladdie?”; Vlad points at him with a scowl and shoots a small ecto-beam. Danny doesn’t bother blocking or even moving and just lets himself get knocked back into the rubble/bush. 

Flynn blinks, “... Red girl was ‘ight, do ya know tha word ‘dodge’ at all, shorty”. Vlad makes a sound that is almost a laugh.

“Hey”. Flynn shakes his head and Vlad smirks as Danny scramble crawls back in through the window, “I will have you know-”, grunt, “-I took that hit for comical effect”, landing on the floor with a not so graceful ‘oof’ before righting himself to be cross-legged and looking up at the two men, “and if anything is gonna get me hurt then it better be my terrible sense of comedy”. 

Vlad rolls his eyes, “at least you know it’s terrible and unpleasant”. Danny points at him, “my name’s a literal pun, of course it’s terrible. Not unpleasant though. Also-”, holding up a finger and grabbing out his phone to quickly scroll through it, “-and yup! Tuck hacked the gov! Man my main man really should scare the government more or at least enough for them to properly put him on a watch list or two, geez”. 

Flynn blinks, “ya lost me”, while Danny pockets his phone. Vlad _also_ _blinks_. Okay wow there are similarities here and it’s kinda freaking Danny just a tiny bit, it’s creepy alright. Vlad shakes his head at Danny, “you can let your tech boy know that for once he has impressed me”. Danny grins slightly manically, whips out his phone, goes to the voice memos app, and holds it up ready to record, “care to repeat that?”, grin never faltering. Vlad sighs into his hand, sounding truly and exaggeratedly pained, “Tucker, you have impressed me”. Danny cheers, “yes!”, quietly to himself while double fist-pumping. 

Flynn shakes his head and mutters, “ghosts”. Probably deciding that this behaviour is very befitting of ghosts, which yeah is probably true. Least Flynn just seems amused by it rather than annoyed like Danny’s folks would be. Vlad seems to agree as he sighs and side-eyes Flynn, “at least you seem unbothered by our more... _ghostly_ behaviours, most humans get put-off just enough to make them rather unsuitable for any kind of close relations”. 

That gets Danny to inhumanly quickly jump to his feet, startling Flynn enough to get that staff pointed at him as he near shouts excitedly, “did you just admit you can’t make friends!”, pointing animatedly at Vlad, “I’ve spotted character development!”. Vlad just glares at him, which is fair, while Flynn relaxes his stance. Danny sticks his hands back in his pockets and relaxes against the countertop, “anyway, since you’ve apparently given Flynn here your fatherly approval -congrats on the kid by the way, what should I bring to the baby shower?- you gonna stick him as your heir instead me now. Pretty please?”, and gives an overly innocent smile. 

Vlad sighs, “I’m going to murder you”, and shakes his head, “you’re the High King, _of course not,_ I’ve certainly got to keep you in my relations somehow”, grinning smugly, “I can certainly have two heirs. I don’t see why not. Try as I might, you know how I am quite a greedy man”. Danny snorts because that’s bullshit, Vlad absolutely _doesn’t_ try to not be greedy; but well... when possession is your Obsession... Danny chuckles, “and try as I might, I just can’t keep that hero complex down. Guess I’ve just gotta keep an eye on your dealings with Flynn here, huh old man?”. After all, when protection is your Obsession...

Flynn promptly smacks both of them with his staff, “Obsession posturin’”. Danny rubs his head and grumbles incoherently. Vlad acts like nothing happened, instead insulting Danny’s behaviour, “well don’t you sound kingly”. Danny flips him off. Vlad looks to Flynn, ignoring Danny entirely, “regardless, you’ll definitely be my heir too. Whether you want to be or not”.

Danny snorts, “I don’t think you need to threaten the guy to be your son, vampy, geez. Would it kill ya to be nice?”. Vlad grins, “yes”; which Danny rolls his eyes at. Flynn huffs and shakes his head, “heir’s some money thing, he’s my pa not money loan”. Danny blinks, surprised the guy knows what a money loan even is. Chuckling, “eh heir’s kinda the best you get from old Vladdie here”, and jabs a thumb at Vlad. 

Vlad scowls, “that is because you keep snubbing me and refusing to renounce your fool of a father, Daniel”, side-eyeing Flynn, “Flynn doesn’t seem to have that particular issue”, and then gives Flynn a truly stiff and awkward head pat. Flynn looks like he’s judging him heavily for that, “I’m stayin’ ‘ere. I don’ trust ya”. Danny coughs and laughs while Vlad jerks and looks like he just got stabbed clear through the heart _and_ Core. Ouch Vladdie, looks like someone got snubbed again. Tough luck, try not being evil next time. Or maybe it was the awkward head pat that did it? 

All three flinch or jump at Jack’s sudden excited, “yes!”, while popping out from the lab doorway, practically shoving Vlad out of the kitchen, and very quickly side-hugging Flynn who very obviously stiffens and shrinks away from the contact. Oh shit, how long have his folks been there?!? Fuck. His mom also giggles from the doorway and walks in giving Flynn a sweet smile while pulling Jack off him, “as we said, there’s definitely room for you here”. Flynn just nods slightly while slowly relaxing as Maddie pushes Jack out of the room to go clean the spare room upstairs with her. Danny, meanwhile, is busy side-eyeing Vlad as the man borderline flat-out snarls at Jack’s receding form.

Flynn stares at Vlad himself, muttering lowly at Danny, “he hates ‘im. He really really hates ‘im”. Danny sighs and watches the deep violent hatred shining in Vlad’s eyes, “yeah, yeah he really does”, frowning and probably sounding sadder than he really means to, “I wish that wasn’t how things were. Everything would be a lot different”; because really? If Vlad didn’t despise his father, the two only natural halfas in existence would probably get along. Maybe be genuine family or healthy rivals even. Instead of the weird toxic degrading bantering archenemy thing they’ve got going on and have been actively -and mutually, if he’s being honest with himself- fuelling. Maybe, _maybe_ , that mentor/apprentice situation, that Vlad dreamed of and Danny had needed, could have became reality; but that ship has long since past. In Danny’s more introspective and thoughtful moments, he mourned that fact. Part of him hoped Vlad acknowledged and mourned that fact too, instead of just feeling bitter and ripped off. Maybe. Hopefully. 

Flynn frowns at him, “yer ghosts an yer humans. Act like it”. Danny blinks at him, “uh, I don’t think you exactly _know_ how humans act. No offence”. Flynn huffs at him, “am one, know ‘nough”. 

“Uh, I’m not gonna agree with you on that one”, glaring slightly and whispering, “also, sssshhhh about the ghost shit, man”. Flynn rolls his eyes and promptly catches Danny off-guard, “an I’m keepin’ tha Masters name”. Danny chokes slightly, well damn; Vlad’s gonna get an ego boost from that. 

Vlad, having of course heard -damn you ghost ears- snaps his head around and grins triumphantly at Danny then approvingly at Flynn. “Flynn Masters”, grinning smugly at Danny again, “might just have a better ring than Daniel Masters”.

Danny snorts and rolls his eyes, “if you’re trying to make me jealous it ain’t gonna work”, snickering, “but FM, like FM radio”. Now Danny’s wearing the smug look while Vlad glares at him. Danny finger guns at Vlad as he starts walking towards the steps, “now how about I let the _Masters caspers_ not have to be _actors_ due to me being one of the present _factors_ while y’all deal with your family _matters_ ”, saluting, “so seeya later _gangsters_ ”. Vlad’s left eye twitches, “I will murder you, boy”. 

Flynn blinks and looks to Vlad, “he always like this?”. Vlad sighs and nods, “unfortunately”, shaking his head, “he certainly has a taste for puns and word games, I think it’s born from some form of a sadistic side”. Flynn huffs, “dramatic”, huffing again, “an I need a drink aftar all yer ghostin’, pa”, and uncaps his liquor bottle for a swig. Earning raised eyebrows from Vlad and the same lean over sniff that Danny did, “ahh, you’re a fan of alcohol”. 

“Make mine own”. 

Vlad nods approvingly, “I've dabbled in the art of wine making myself in my spare time”. Flynn offers his drink earning him a quirked eyebrow from Vlad, who of course tries some. Leaving him humming to himself and tapping his chin, “you’ve been at this for a while. You might be a son of mine yet”. 

Flynn huffs, “‘ere I thought we ‘ready established that. Yer my pa. Pas that”. They were, in fact, already past that. Vlad just rolls his eyes but pulls a flask out of his pocket and offers it to the guy, “here. Since you’re a Masters, you drink whiskey like a Masters”. And Flynn talking a swig from that is what Danny walks back downstairs to, “so what y’all talking about?”. 

Vlad turns to him, “just how you were going to apologise for your years of abuse to me all in the name of brotherly love”. 

“That doesn’t sound like me at all”. Danny then blinks at them, with Flynn lowering the flask and shrugging at. Danny throws a slight glare at Vlad, “really? I leave for what? ten minutes? and you start boozing the guy up? _Really_?”, muttering more so to himself, “I mean sure, Flynn started drinking after ten minutes, or whatever, of meeting me. But _still_ ”. Vlad smirks some, “yes, being around you for any prolonged period of time could drive anyone to drink. Why, the first thing I did after meeting you was drink”. 

“That’s because dad assaulted your prized football, you going senile on me?”. 

Flynn glares at Danny and takes another swig of the whiskey flask, which Vlad looks oddly triumphant over; especially considering Danny just insulted him. Flynn shrugs again and side-eyes Vlad, “eh, mine’s bettar”. Vlad waves him off, “you just don’t have a taste for it yet”, tapping his chin, “though yes, yours is quite good”. 

Danny blinks, “did _the_ Vlad Masters just genuinely compliment someone without it being backhanded or a thinly veiled threat? Shocked! Betrayed! Dismayed! The _horror_!”, tilting his head, wait a fucking minute, “wait, did you drink Flynn’s stuff? You know that’s ectoplasm in there, right?”. Flynn grunts, “well he does now”. Vlad blinks and Danny is detecting just a hint of shock there; Vlad is also clearly eyeing Flynn’s liquor hip bottle with a fair bit more appreciation now. Flynn making a disgusted face kinda cuts off Vlad’s appreciation though and Danny feels like he’s getting a flashback to that time Tucker had to eat all those blood blossoms. “Are you gonna throw up?”. 

Vlad scowls, crosses his arms, and sticks his nose up in the air, “of course not, a Masters can handle his liquor”. Danny rolls his eyes while telekinetically moving a trashcan over to Flynn, “I don’t think that’s the problem here”. 

Both of them look down as Flynn just kinda sits on the floor, puts his staff to the side, and throws up; at least he aims into the bucket instead of onto the floor. “Congrats Vlad, I think you just poisoned him”. Danny furrows his eyebrows a bit though when Vlad actually holds his hands out, bends down, and pats the guy on the back. Okay... guess Vlad’s being decent... Danny doesn’t actually know what to do with that. Ah the fact that he doesn’t know what to do with Vlad acting like a decent human being is probably actually concerning, come to think of it. So Danny does the logical thing and slaps himself across the face. 

Vlad gives Flynn a not awkward head pat this time, “there there, just get it out of your system”, he hums, “I am rather surprised though, two sips isn’t exactly much”. 

Danny sighs and taps his chin, “well when you consider the fact that he’s lived off nothing but ectoplasmic fauna and flora, makes sense that his body would kinda have forgotten _how to fucking digest human food you stupid nutcase_. Geez, for a guy who plays chess you’re not very smart”. Vlad looks back to him and glares slightly, “I’m surprised you know that. Did you actually pay attention in health class for once?“. Danny rolls his eyes at that particular jab, “one of my friends only eats plants and one only eats meat, what do you think happens every time some bull crap happens where they have to break their diets?”. 

Regardless Danny sighs some and bends down next to Vlad and Flynn, joining Vlad in the back-patting/rubbing. Snickering at the guy some though because people taking you too seriously or being all nice ‘n shit when you’re throwing your guts up was more embarrassing than helpful, “maybe don’t eat or drink shit without ecto in it, yeah?”. 

Flynn grunts, expected, “ßhût üp, ßhørtŷ”. Making Danny and Vlad blink, Vlad grins like an idiot while Danny chuckles, “huh, guess you speak ghost. Though talk about a thick accent there, Ancients”. Vlad shoves Danny head, which Danny let’s knock him over on the ground, “it’s͢ ͘q͟u͘i͜te͞ ͞a̕ ̧useful ̡sk̛i̡l̡l͜,̡ ͜why I̕ thi͡nk he̕’s m͏o͠re f͏l̴u̸e̵nt͠ tha͏n҉ ͜yo̶u, Dan̕i̵eļ”. Danny stays laying on the ground, “I’m̕ ̸a̡ na͏t͠iv̵e spea̡k̷ȩr, so̧ ̛I̕ ͠don̕’̡t͞ ̡th̶ink̷ so”. 

Flynn leans back, pushes away the bucket, and puts his arms on his knees, “ÿæ ßtåŷįñ’ thërë¿“. Danny nods with a grin from the floor and gives a thumbs up, earning a head shake from Flynn. 

All three snap their heads to the kitchen entranceway as feet pound down the steps and Maddie and Jack come barging in, everyone then looking to the lab door as Jazz pushes it open while dusting off her pants and grumbling, “I so do not envy Danny having to clean that all the time”, pausing and looking up around everyone before zeroing in on three people sitting/laying on the floor, “Flynn! Danny! What happened!”, and runs over while glaring at and obviously blaming Vlad, who stands and readjusts his suit like he’s embarrassed to be caught caring. Well get caught by anyone other than Danny anyway; which makes sense ‘cause Vlad would probably be all caring about _Danny_ if Danny wasn’t, you know, not evil. 

Danny rolls over onto his back, looking at Jazz, “guess who can’t stomach human stuff?”, and jabs a thumb towards Flynn while Maddie rushes over and helps Flynn stand. Well okay, Flynn mostly waves off said help and stands up on his own, but still; Flynn also promptly grabs up his staff again. That staff’s probably some kind of comfort item for the guy. 

Jack laughs as he comes to stand next to Vlad, “guess we’ll be cooking with a lot more ecto!”. Danny can practically feel malicious intent wafting of Vlad. Flynn grunting, “I’m ‘ine”. Which Maddie looks at him sweetly over and Jazz shakes her head at, “well let’s move into the living room anyway. Then _you_ -”, glaring at Flynn, “-can sit down, and _we_ can all hear what happened to you”. Vlad nods and hums, “yes I would like to know how I acquired a son from another timeline that’s been living nomadically in the Ghost Zone”. 

Jack laughs as they all walk into the living room, “yup! Most we know is that some darn ghosty called Misery Vex took you at some point!”. Maddie and Jazz watching Flynn with slight worry as they walk. Danny just eyes Vlad to see if Vlad shows even the slightest amount of recognition regarding this ‘Misery Vex’, he doesn’t -fuck Danny’s luck- but Danny can’t exactly expect the man to know of every ghost ever. Regardless Danny skips over, puts his hands behind his back and sticks his face next to Vlad’s, “guessin’ you don’t know who that is either?”. Vlad scowls, “‘fraid not, but when I find them, and I will, I’m going to make them beg me to end them and then I’m going to find out how good ghost skin is at reupholstering my dining room chairs”. 

Danny blinks, “I forgot there was a reason you and Skulker got along. Also, I doubt you have the skill set to be skinning anyone. Also also, I’m amazed you care that much”, and smirks. 

“Must you mock me so, boy”.

Danny grins, “well.., how _would_ you like me to mock you? I’ll hear your requests”, shrugging, “sure I might ignore them, but I’ll certainly hear them”. And finally flops to sit down on the love seat, Vlad sitting next to him with scowl. Jazz opts to sit with Maddie and Jack on the couch, while Flynn takes the chair; got to give the loner nomad his personal space after all.

Flynn huffs, “yeah, Vex’s is tha one that pulled me in ta tha Infinite Realm”. Jack doesn’t give him a chance to say more, tilting his head, “is _that_ what ghosts call the Ghost Zone?!?”. Danny and Vlad both quietly sigh into their hands. Flynn squints at the large man, “ya nevar asked ‘em?”.; at least Maddie and Jack have the decency to look sheepish. Flynn squints more, “it’s what it’s called. Propar name”. Danny chuckles and waves Flynn off, “eh, then Zone can be slang”, ‘Zone’ was in fact common slang. Flynn rolls his eyes. 

Vlad sighs quietly again, “linguistics aside, was there a reason Vex took you? And I’m just to assume you’re in this timeline purely due to your old one ceasing to exist”. Which Danny mutters, “duh”, at. Everyone ignores him as Flynn shrugs, “don’ know, like I’ve said ‘ready, ain’t stickin’ ‘round half spider creature-”. Danny’s wondering if the guy’s getting tired of explaining that. “-bark armour wasn’ friendly lookin’ eithar”. 

Danny eyes Flynn’s bark armour, “guess yours doesn’t make you look all that approachable either”. With Maddie jumping in, “did you get that idea from It?”. Making Flynn blink at her before looking to Danny, “I did say Vex’s a lady, ‘ight?”. Danny nods but Jazz is the one to audibly sigh, drawing Flynn’s attention as she talks, “yes but-”, side-eyeing her parents, “-ghosts don’t get pronouns”. 

Maddie rolls her eyes not unkindly, “now honey, we’ve talked about this, ghosts aren’t sentient or complex enough to understand gender and we don’t call plants ‘he’ or ‘she’-”. Danny coughs into his hand, “Sam does, you know”; which goes ignored. Maddie continuing, “-so why would we do so for ghosts? It would be like assigning gender to lightning”. Danny sighs internally, and he bets both Jazz and Vlad do as-well. 

Flynn just stares at her for a while before blinking, “moron-”. Danny has the distinct feeling his folks are going to be hearing Flynn calling them ‘morons’ an awful lot. “-they have preferances. Blobs are no gendar, not tha Cored”. Vlad sighs dramatically, “what does gender have to do with my son's abduction”. Danny chuckles to himself faintly, guess Vladdie really grabbed onto the whole ‘I have a son’ thing with absolute confidence. Made sense. Ancients if Danny accepted him then the man probably wouldn’t stop using the word ‘son’ at every possible opportunity for a solid month. 

Jack laughs almost awkwardly and scratches his head, “nothing! I guess”. Vlad scowls at him. 

Flynn clears his throat, “well _she_ -”. Nice passive-aggressiveness going on there. “-couldn’ ‘xactly follow me aftar I slippin’ inta some rock crag”, grunting, “ghost can’ go through rocks ‘n what not there”. Jack looks like he’s physically restraining himself from peppering Flynn with questions about that. Danny thinks this should be obvious though, since ghosts not being able to phase through ectoplasmic constructs/formations is literally how ghost shields worked. Like, _duh_. 

Vlad just nods with a hum, “so you’ve been on your own since?”; which Flynn nods at. Maddie huffs, “I’m amazed the ghost didn’t chase you down”; Flynn shrugs, clearly not about to claim to understand why himself. Which yeah, abducting a kid through a portal seemed like a lot of effort to put in to just turn around and let the human run away; probably thought that this random human child wouldn’t be able to effectively avoid capture or survive on his own. Well surprise mother fucker! Flynn’s a Fenton -well a Masters too but whatever- being able to handle ghost shit is in his genes. 

Danny decides to ask something that’s actually mildly important for him to know, “so bark armour and the lower half of a spider, anything else?”. His mom quirks an eyebrow at him so Danny elaborates/makes up an excuse, “wouldn’t it be good to know what a ghost that may come after him looks like?”. Earning an approving hum from her. Danny’s more interested in Vlad muttering to himself, “an Arachne then”; sweet, he’s got a species now. 

Flynn grunts, “purpal skin, lotsa black eyes, bare bark crown-”. Danny almost chokes at that and he’s sure Vlad at least went slightly wide-eyed, because crown implied royalty. Which just great, that meant Danny was going to have to deal with whoever all kingly and shit. “-an clothes were shinebettle, I think-”. So basically shiny latex leather? Alright, that’s a look. “-an wendigo mane pelt ovar spidar half-”. Well that all but confirms Danny’s suspicions that Vex is from or at least frequents the FairLands. The only wendigo’s that didn’t just turn to ectoplasmic ash when destroyed were the faebeast ones. Hooray for having to probably go see Oberon. “-She had a fauchard ta”. Danny nods to himself. 

Jack taps his chin, “that still doesn’t explain _why_ though”, earning shrugs all around. Jack grinning, “we should hunt Vex down and find out!”. Which Vlad actually grins at, “yes, you go do that”. Danny kicking the man subtly and whispering, “Vlad no. Bad”, he knows the only reasons Vlad’s encouraging that is ‘cause his folks might torture the ghost and because the ghost might harm/kill Jack. 

Maddie shakes her head and chastises Jack, “you’ll be doing no such thing, we don’t know the Zone is _actually_ safe”, glancing at Flynn, “regardless of Flynn’s survival. Flukes happen”. Danny thinks it would make way more sense to guess it's safer than they thought than to just assume Flynn got lucky. But hey! At least he doesn’t have to worry as much that his folks are just going to run wild in the Zone anytime soon. 

Vlad rolls his eyes though speaks somewhat sweetly, “dear Maddie, always being the voice of reason”. Maddie grimaces, and Flynn glances between them with a slight frown. Vlad digs in his pocket when his ringer goes off though. Speaking up after reading the screen, “seems some of the underlings are too moronic to deal with some problem alone”, looking up to everyone, “so I must be taking my leave now”, and stands up. 

Jack jumping up, “well we can finish up Flynn’s room and he can join us after you’ve said your goodbyes! Wouldn’t want to interrupt that!”, and laughs. Maddie smiling sweetly and following him once again upstairs. Jazz sighs and moves to follow them, “I’ll make sure they didn’t get carried away”; while Danny just stretches and lounges out across the loveseat. Watching Vlad talk down at the still seated Flynn. 

“I guess I’ll have to leave dealing with this Misery Vex in your and young Daniel’s hands. I don’t particularly have time to deal with petty ghost squabbles”, side-eyeing Danny, “he’s quite experienced with those though, so I doubt he’ll fail to be an effective meat-shield if needed”. 

Flynn rolls his eyes, “I don’ care ta ‘deal with’ her at all. ‘Ine as is”. While Danny snorts at Vlad, “Ancients, you’re such a fucking pissant”. 

Earning squinting from Vlad, “I’m the _mayor_ and one of the _richest people in the world_ ”, huffing, “and I’m nothing to scoff at power-wise”. 

“You are staying that... to the literal king... _of death_ ”. Danny smirks, “I’m fucking lucifer, bitch”. Vlad and Flynn blink and stare at him. Danny rubs his neck, “eh, too much?”. They both nod slightly. And there the similarities go being creepy again. Vlad shakes his head slowly, looking back to Flynn, “ignoring that, you can contact me for anything. Particularly if you decide being here isn’t worth the effort or annoyance”, and pats Flynn’s head, “you’ll want for nothing regardless”, making shooing motions at him, “now run along and help your mother and sister stop that imbecile from installing an anti-ghost auto-detection machine gun on your ceiling or some other nonsense”. Danny vaguely hates that his dad might _actually_ do that. Though he’s surprised that Flynn actually does as he’s told with only a mild amount of suspicious squinting. Maybe he’s tired of Vlad’s existence? Doubtful but Danny can hope. Probably more likely the guy just wanted to get closer to being able to have some alone time, and room set up was an effective way to do that. 

Danny waits till Flynn disappears upstairs to speak up, “hey Vlad?”. Vlad doesn’t even look back at him, instead just staring up the stairs, “hmmm?”.

“Don’t fuck this up. You know, like you always do”. Danny glares seriously at Vlad as he goes to stand up and Vlad actually looks to him with a quirked eyebrow, “but if you ever hurt him you won’t need to wonder where your god is anymore, because he’s coming for you and he’ll be fresh outta mercy”, squinting, “all these fucks will have flown off, never to return again. And you will be left crippled, withered, dried up and crapped on. At the bottom of a shitty little well where people will throw out their rotten fruit down on you and the remnants of your shitty little life”, glaring more, “ **we clear** ”. Vlad nods a bit stiffly; after all, when the king orders something or warns you, you fucking listen. Danny decides to really hammer it home though, “the fucking heat death of the universe will not be able to even approach the level of damage that the amount of fucks I will no longer give will cause you. What I’m saying is, I wouldn’t mind tearing out a length of your intestines, rolling it in a pan, sprinkling on some nice cinnamon and maybe some raisins. You know, for texture and a little added surprise. Then sliding it right into the oven for a nice little cinnamon bun”, chuckling meanly, “there’s even some icing pre-made in the fridge. So I’m all ready to go, bitch. Then I could use your hollowed-out torso to ride you like a meat toboggan. I’m sure your fucking intestines could be utilised as perfectly fine ropes to control my descent down the bloody snow-covered hill all the way into the depths of madness that you were birthed from years ago”. 

“Daniel... you’ve made your point”, Vlad actually sounds slightly disturbed. Danny rolls his eyes and puts his hand in his pockets, “yeah well, so long as you don’t go making god sacrificing his only son look like a _good_ parenting technique”. 

“I... won’t”. 

Danny pats Vlad on the arm, “good talk then”, and finger guns before heading upstairs, “and I’m still not your fam, frootloop”. Vlad just scowls at him and leaves, closing the door slightly louder than necessary. Return to normalcy achieved. 


	6. In The Search For Misery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Danny’s got a royal abductor to find and Flynn gets confused a bunch.

Danny waits till nightfall to actually start looking into this Vex’s ghost. Getting Flynn comfy was honestly more important. Danny has a feeling they’re going to find him sleeping in the yard under a tree frequently though. Dude did not seem like the type that would actually be comfortable sleeping in a closed-in space, you know, like a bedroom. And hey, Danny could dig it, he’s slept on the roof more than once. Different reasons but hey, same outdoor sleeping end result. 

Anyway, Danny cracks open the book ClockWork gave him as a mild form of punishment and flips to the FairLands section; after he figured out where in the book that section even _was_. If he couldn’t understand ghost then he’d be fucked. Course he was a ghost so he’d be fucked in a great many and far more inconvenient ways if he couldn’t understand this. Though now he’s wondering if Flynn can read ghost or even possibly read it better than English. 

Is he surprised the first thing he sees is about Titania and the second thing is about Oberon? No. They’re queen and king, makes sense. Danny’s more interested in the different court rulers, since y’ know, Vex apparently had a crown. Weird thing is, considering the whole Oberon and Titania _knighting him_ you’d think they’d have told him about _all_ the royal fae. But no. Apparently not. That or Danny is totally wrong. In which case Danny’s gonna be stuck reading this entire book searching for a needle in a haystack, so here’s hoping not. 

Spring court? Nope, that’s Gadfly. Whom Danny doesn’t trust with even an inch of half his life.

Summer court? Naw, that’s Jaydance. She’s actually pretty nice and has stupid good fashion sense. She gifted him one of his favourite capes. 

Autumn court? Not that one either. Rook’s the Prince there. Weird guy, but also unusually human friendly. 

Winter court? He’s actually not that familiar with the Winter Court. According to the book Deirdre-Primrose is the princess there. Never met her. Or even heard of her. This could be a good excuse to go say hi though. As one of the Fair Knights he had every rhyme and reason to meet every royal; and as High King they can’t exactly say no. Honestly, Danny wasn’t all that familiar with the Winter Court itself. The other courts didn’t exactly... _like_ them. Though really, Danny should arguably get along, being a Frostling, being Ice Cored. Icy bro’s gotta stick together you know. 

Danny doesn’t want to give up on this ‘Vex being one of the Fair Folk’ possibility yet, he really doesn’t want to have to read this whole damn book. Danny was more of a doer than a reader. But before he goes running/flying headlong into the Zone, he could at least _ask_ Flynn if the place he got yanked through the portal near was icy? That would probably be smart. 

Dude’s gonna be so annoyed Danny’s barging in on his long-awaited alone time. Which really just makes Danny snicker as he gets up and sticks his head intangibly through his walls. 

“Heyya!”. Danny has to yank his head back through the wall when Flynn throws the ecto-ice dagger at his face. Danny snickers to himself and sticks his head through slower this time, “got your murderous urges out?”, turns his head to the knife that’s halfway imbedded in the wall. Whistling, “wow you’ve got one Hell of an arm on you”, looking back to Flynn, who’s squinting at him, “anyway, now that you’re done trying to stick a knife through my face, I have some ideas, or one idea really, where Vexxy might be”, rolling his eyes, “now I know you don’t really care, but I do. So question? When you got your ass yoinked into the Zone, what’d your surroundings look like?”. 

Flynn stares at him for a bit before shaking his head and huffing, “‘ine”, but gestures to a box -that Danny’s sure wasn’t there before- instead of giving Danny his answer. Danny watching him roughly grab and lift up a fist full of... _ties_ , Flynn pointing at them, “what”.

Danny walks fully through the wall, for fucks sake Vlad. The poor guy’s confused and out of his element enough as it is. Though yeah, Danny saw this coming. Considering Vlad gave Danny presents, usually expensive ones, it made sense he’d do that to Flynn. That and Flynn’s ‘fashion’ wasn't exactly rich guy chic. Danny’s just slightly surprised Vlad gave him ties instead of the bow tie thing Vlad usually wore. Shaking his head, “you wear those around your neck, I could show you but they literally do nothing. You’re supposed to wear them to look ‘professional’ and ‘well off’. Usually worn with suits, which is pretty much all Vlad ever wears”. Flynn huffs, and based on the fact that the guy hadn’t changed his clothing or even taken off the bark armour, Danny doubts he’s going to go for the ties anytime soon. Getting him into pants seemed like a better starting point anyway. 

Glancing around, there are more boxes and things that definitely weren’t there before. Shaking his head, “you better get used to Vlad giving you stuff and throwing money at you. He does that even to me, and we’re not related”. Flynn smiles slightly, so Danny guesses that’s not gonna be an issue. That’s probably for the best. “Also, he _will_ fit you for a suit eventually”, sounding just slightly bitter, “even if he has to bribe you into”. Danny would know, Danny experienced it. Flynn chuckles at him, obviously getting that Danny’s speaking from experience. “Anyway, back to my question”, waving at the boxes, “and I can help go through and explain whatever the fuck Vlad dropped off without any form of prompting later. If you want that is”. 

Flynn nods and hums while sitting back down cross-legged on the bed. Danny walking over and flopping down on his back, rolling his wrist for Flynn to start speaking. 

Flynn rolls his eyes slightly, “white pillars. Bare gray trees an evargreens, wintar heath, paparbrush, an snowdrop. Have some”, and digs in one of his bags, pulling out a ball-shaped flower tinted a deep bruise purple. Danny fingers it and is only vaguely surprised it’s cold to the touch. “An ground cold. ‘Ery cold fer long time”. 

Danny snorts, “explains your interest in getting Phoenix feathers for warmth and shit”. Flynn huffs but nods. And Danny just feels like his suspicions have been confirmed. There wasn’t a lot of snowy places in the Zone. The Far Frozen didn’t exactly have flowers, like, _at all_. So definitely not there. Meanwhile, good luck _not_ finding flowers in the FairLands. Those fuckers were everywhere. Plants in general were everywhere. And ice pillars could make for decent fae dens. 

Danny nodding to himself, “well I feel like that all but confirms things for me”, continuing at Flynn’s quirked eyebrow, “and here I thought you didn’t give a shit”, earning a scowl from the guy. Danny waves him off, “fine fine. Kinda sounds like you’re describing what’s likely the Winter Court in the FairLands. Never been myself but I’ve been to the Summer Court so I have an idea what the place should look like. Plus this Vex’s clothing sounds to be made out of things native to the FairLands”. Flynn nods a little, probably deciding Danny’s logic makes sense. 

Danny squints his eyes and smacks his forehead, “I’m a dumbass”, jerking to sit up and snapping his head to Flynn, “if she intended to take you into slash keep you in the FairLands then she might have given you a fairy mark, since the FairLands is stupid dangerous for mortals to so much as enter none the less stay in without one”. Shuffling closer to Flynn, “soooooo, you got any odd body markings? Like, say, a little pale blue crystal imbedded in your skin somewhere?”. Flynn blinks at him, looking just slightly weirded out, before nodding slightly and turning around; pulling off the Minotaur shawl in the process. Him thumbing the base of his neck, just under the neck hole of his shirt/dress thing. 

Danny takes the goddamn hint and pulls the shirt thing down some, and yup! pale blue crystal that looked like there was a tiny flame in it if he squinted; meaning a human wouldn’t even be able to see it at all. Danny nods curtly to himself as he lets go and Flynn rounds on him, “it dangerous?”. Danny waving him off immediately, “naw, just gives you a little bit of a Willow o’ Whisp allowing you to be able to navigate your way out of the FairLands if needed. Pretty much stops any Fair Folk from trapping you there or making you wander woods endlessly. Also would stop you from eventually becoming a ghost after staying in the lands too long, so it can be kinda life saving”. 

Flynn frowns slightly, “so she didn’ want me dead”. Danny shrugs nonchalantly, “guess not. Arguably, right, that’s a good thing. All things considered”. Flynn doesn’t hesitate to nod at that; because yeah, _not dying_ , was generally a good thing. Danny’s general pro-his-own-death opinion wasn’t exactly common or normal or even healthy. Danny sticks up a finger, “also kinda somewhat explains her nabbing you. Fair Folk _love_ red-heads”. Flynn scowls at him. Understandable, hair colour wasn’t a very good reason. Ghosts were petty but generally not _that_ petty. 

Danny puts his hands behind his head, “whelp, guess I really do have some evidence to go on that isn’t just hearsay and personal suspicious feelings. Nice. Oberon might be a little miffed I figured out things he opted out of telling me”, and snickers. Flynn blinks at him, “Oberon?”. Surprising Danny just slightly, “how have you not heard about the Alder King? The King of the Fair? What about his wife? Titania? Queen Of Albion’s Night? The Queen of the Fair?”. Flynn just blinks in confusion. Danny shakes his head sadly, “well I guess you don’t exactly socialise much and the Fair do tend to keep to themselves”, and sighs. 

Flynn huffs, “er what ya know ain’t common knowledge”. Danny waves him off, even if the guy’s probably right. But in his defence, royalty being common knowledge only makes sense. But well, it wasn’t like the ruler of a land you didn’t live in affected your life; unlike the ruler of your species or the dimension you live in anyway. Danny might question the intellect of anyone who hasn’t at least heard of Pariah or himself nowadays. 

Regardless Danny stands up and brushes off his pants, “eh, at least you know of the ghosties I’m gonna go see now. I’m gonna take a gander and say you’re not interested in tagging along?”. Flynn rolls his eyes and moves to shove Danny towards the door; which Danny, being a good brother, lets him do. 

Flynn sticking his head out of the doorway before fully closing the door, “don’ get ended”. Making Danny grin stupidly, “awww you care”, chuckling, “don’t worry, man, I’m a durable strong little bastard. Plus Oberon likes me”, tilting his head, “Titania is more partial, she usually only favours fellow Fair ones so expected, but if she had it her way I’d live in the FairLands”, shrugging, “the two of them couldn’t get grantedship of me so they knighted me as the only way to stake any claim of me. They’re not the only ones to do that”. Flynn grunts, “dramatic”, and shuts the door; leaving Danny chuckling to himself. 

* * *

Since Danny actually knows where he’s going it doesn’t take him very long to be floating just a bit away from one of the sparkling doors to the FairLands, situated in/at the base of a large wisteria tree; the leaves swaying with the sound of light tinkling bells only making that fact all the more obvious. Oh, not to mention the faint nearly inaudible mischievous laughter, which anyone who’s anyone knows is supposed to lure people in. 

Unfortunately it worked uncomfortably well on children. Danny was still, annoyingly, a child ghost, so the effect was there a little. Not that any Fair one would get the satisfaction of thinking it actually worked on him, since Danny motherfucking Phantom went where and when ever he wanted. 

Deciding to be a bit of a snide bastard, Danny waves his hand dismissively at the doorway, “yes yes, I hear you, I hear you. Feel free to let that crazy nutter Oberon know I’m coming. Not for anything official”, chuckling, “though I’m sure I can’t exactly have a conversation without getting dragged to a feast”. Or maybe the man will take mercy on him and just insist on tea. That would be nice. 

Regardless, he steps through and onto the path. 

Fae paths were one thing he particularly liked about the FairLands. They were pretty and seemed endless from the inside. Peppered with sparkling flowers always in bloom and trees higher than the eye could see; you couldn’t even fly to the top of them. There was lots of myths of mortals who entered getting driven mad but Danny just feels reminded of the vastness of space. Sometimes you could stumble on ponds that were quite literally bottomless; Danny, seeing as he doesn’t need to breathe, has indeed tried to find a bottom. Titania had found that particular antic ‘adorable’ and giggled at him. Danny was too busy being enamoured by the pretty sparkling deep blue water. Again, like space! 

He doesn’t really feel like being distracted/exploring today so instead he just floats along, weaving in between trees occasionally and following the mushrooms that blinked light like fireflies. 

By the feel it takes him about five minutes to get through, even if it had seemed like it took at least an hour. Fae really liked to fuck with peoples sense of time like that; didn’t generally work on ghosts though. Does leave Danny wondering how long Flynn must have wandered till he got out of the FairLands...

Shaking off the fairy dust from his cape, he had to make a pit stop at Phantom’s Keep for one of his nicer more nature-y ones since he doesn’t really feel like dealing with a slightly insulted Titania. Sure he smartly went with a more wintery dark blue one with thick white stag fur trim, didn’t want to ‘offend’ the Winter Court by wearing the other courts colours. That would be a _great_ way to start relations with a royal he’s never meet before, by offending them. Which okay fine... usually he started relations by beating the crap out of them but whatever. And since this Vex -who he might run into- had a bunch of black eyes he figured the black onyx on the straps that went over his chest to hold the cape in place would probably be a winner. Sure capes that only covered one shoulder, and effectively covered that entire side of his body, got in the way but hey did look cool as shit! In the fight of practicality vs fashion, fashion always won when dealing with the Fair Folk. Hence why he was also wearing his crown fashionably and loosely around his throat instead of its proper spot. Danny was a joke, a very content and smug joke. 

Danny isn’t even slightly surprised when one the spriggan appears next to him after stepping out from around a tree -that they definitely weren’t behind moments ago- and greets him, “he of frosts song and thorns blessing, merry meet and blessed be we. Her majesty awaits, Suffered King”. Danny chuckles to himself and gets a slight blush out of them by patting their head. They studiously ignore him and his mischievousness, and stamp their staff on the ground, “let flowers of old bloom to mark the way for the Lord loved by myths. Be there not a spot of sunlight pass to melt the Lord worshiped by ice. Nor root to trip and slow the Lord guided by time”; and off they go following the trail of Phantom Fern Flowers (cheeky Fair Folk, poking fun at his name), the fact that they’re also thorned doesn’t go unnoticed either. 

It doesn’t take them long, and surprise surprise, Titania is sitting elegantly amongst flowers sipping tea -yes! Danny might just be in luck- and Oberon is swinging/hanging upside down from a tree branch humming to himself. The spriggan makes themselves scarce real fast; understandable. 

“Merry meet, Titania, Oberon”. Could anyone else get away with forgoing royal titles with Titania? Haha, fuck no. But Danny didn’t have to use royal titles unless he damn well wanted to. 

Oberon flips off the branch, landing on the ground with a grin and his hands on his fur-covered hips, “Phantom! It has been too long!”, prancing over and hugging Danny in such a way as to smush their faces together, “found yourself a pretty little consort yet?”, whirling Danny around and grabbing him by the shoulders, “are they pretty? Oh they certainly must be! A blonde for sure!”, grinning mischievously, “or black-haired mayhaps, hmmmmm?”. 

Danny rolls his eyes and chuckles, “still contentedly single, I’m afraid”. Oberon pouts more than a little dramatically. Titania smiles faintly and hums, “Oberon dear, stop pestering the child. Though far be it for me to bet on who he’ll fancy”. Danny resists groaning, they always do this to him and seeming annoyed only encouraged it. It doesn’t help that he can never figure out if they’re talking about Sam -not happening. Nope- or Val -which maybe, if she wasn't trying to _murder him_ \- or, Ancients, even _Tuck_ -just no- could be who they’re talking about. Technically Paulina also had black hair but Danny’s not dumb enough to think she’s who they’re referring to, not to mention Danny would without question date Sam, Tuck _and_ Val, _simultaneously_ , before Paulina nowadays.

Thankfully Titania takes mercy on his soul, “sit, enjoy some tea. It’s wrothworts and elderflower. I’m quite sure you’ll find it to your tastes”. Danny does as he’s told -he will have you know that he is, in fact, capable of being respectful... To people who’ve earned it anyway- and sits gently on the grass; cape trailing on the ground behind him. Danny studiously ignores the ghost orchids that sprout and bloom around it. The fact that no poppies show up tells him they’re in a good mood though. The Fair Folk didn’t exactly... _like_ halfas in general, and the lands showed it with poppies the colour of mortal blood. Hence why Vlad like to strictly pretend the Fair Folk didn’t exist at all. Danny’s also pretty sure they’d only tolerate Elle due to her being a Phantom and High Princess. 

Oberon also flops himself down on the ground, crossing his legs and putting his elbows on his knees, chin in palm and grinning at Danny, “so what _really_ brings you?”. With Titania immediately chastising him, “hush, let us enjoy our time and drinks. I’m sure the boy will tell us when he feels”. 

Danny chuckles, sipping his tea, it was good as usual. “Can’t a guy visit his subjects and friends for idle chit chat and some fun?”. Oberon gives him an endearing amused eye roll and Titania crinkles her eyes while humming disbelievingly. Because yeah, Danny never fucking did that. He should though, honestly. Maybe once he’s out of Highschool and thus has more free time? Maybe. Hopefully. Probably not if he’s being honest with himself. Danny sips some more and moves to lay on his side, putting his head in one palm, “I kid, could you imagine if I did that now? Why I’d be run of my feet!”.

Titania sips with a small smile, “you wouldn’t be so if you’d simply come here”. Oberon nods exaggeratedly and excitedly, “ah huh! ah huh!”. 

Danny gives a deadpan, “not happening”, that’s one lesson well learned: never leave wiggle room with the Fair. While Titania’s expression remains unchanged, Oberon pouts at him and slouches. Chuckling, Danny decides to actually get to the point, “but say, have you heard of one by the name ‘Misery Vex’?”. Judging by Titania’s disgusted, but somehow still beautiful-looking, scowl, the answer was ‘yes’. So Danny nods curtly to himself while fiddling with his cup slightly, “I see. Well it would seem that she abducted my half-brother some time ago”. 

Both of them frown heavily, which did make sense because abducting literally any of Phantom’s loved ones was, you know, _bad_ ; and Phantom didn’t tend to take it very well or kindly. And for someone from a place that’s allied itself with him to do that? Oh boy. 

Danny takes his head off his one hand and waves them off pacifyingly, “now no need to worry, I’m just looking to... _talk_ ”, did Danny deliberately say that in a way that implies it was going to be less ‘talking’ and more ‘righteous punishment’? Yes, yes he did. Both because he can kinda be a dick, and because it will discourage any listening ears. Ghosts love their gossip after all. It was a wonderful agent of chaos and even Danny loved a good rumour or two... or twenty. Especially if it was something ridiculous, especially especially if it was something ridiculous _about him_. 

Oberon laughs, though Danny can pick up on a slight tenseness there; which he smiles with obviously fake sweetness over while Oberon talks, “oh I’m sure my dear sweet Titania would love to tell you _all about that one_!”, and hides a sneaky small smile with his tea cup; Titania glares. Oh he is so going to be paying for that one later. But considering Mr. King here is a complete masochist, that might be the point. 

Regardless Titania sighs daintily but exasperatedly, “her story is much the same as Desiree, the poor child”. Danny can’t help chuckling and butting in, Desiree was the first Fair -a changing specifically- he ever met after all. Meaning she got a nickname, “ah Candy Pants”, earning giggling from Oberon. He can feel Titania’s glare though, even if he can hardly see it. Her continuing, “yes, except she was never one of your living”, shaking her head, “a Fair who fancied a mortal”. Danny elects to ignore the disgusted way she said that. 

Oberon hums playfully and butts in, because he just can’t help himself, “but of course that didn’t work out -ow!”. Danny is willing to bet Titania is responsible for the pine cone that just pelted Oberon in the head. Titania continuing while Oberon rubs his head while pouting silently. “The mortal man was murdered by another out of jealousy”, and shakes her head. Danny absolutely hears Oberon mutter, “silly creatures, she could have just had them both”. Danny knows damn well Oberon means that less as encouraging a poly/open relationship and more as having multiple playthings. A Fair toying with mortals? A-okay. A Fair actually _being in love with one_? Not so much.

Titania gives Oberon a very quick agreeing hum -that Danny ignores- before looking back to Danny, “so as such she faked her ‘death’ by throwing herself out of a moving chariot”. Which Danny snorts at, speaking very sarcastically, “well that’s not dramatic at all”, and sips his tea. She smiles sweetly at him, but in a vaguely malicious way, before continuing, “having finished her folly with the mortals, she returned to us. As if nothing had happened in the slightest”; she sounds at least a little insulted by that. Which means she was actually very much infuriated by it. Which seems extreme to Danny but what does he know. He chooses to take another sip instead of comment. 

Oberon leans forward and holds up a clawed finger, “you must understand, child. An Ancient?-”. Danny chokes on his drink faintly at that. While Oberon closes his eyes and shakes his head, “-and a princes no less? We certainly couldn’t let that stand”, and nods strongly to himself with a huff. 

Danny’s got a fair few issues with this. Not only is he dealing with a princess, but also an Ancient? Seriously? Why was this his luck? I mean sure, he’s dealt with more Ancients that pretty much all other ghosts, but still. Just... come on!

Titania nods at Oberon slightly before looking back to Danny and sipping her tea, “and when she wouldn’t relinquish her crown, by choice or _by force_ -”. Danny kinda wants to ask, but Fair Folk could be brutal when it came to forcefully taking things from each other. Like... ripping each other limb from limb or cutting things off kind of brutal. Danny could do with not hearing where Dan probably got a lot of his more... creative ideas. Titania grins cheerily, “-so we merely cut off the court entirely”. Whelp. That explains why Danny knew so little about this. He’s also pretty sure any human would consider _cutting off one-fourth of your kingdom because you didn’t like who one ruler wanted to mack lips with_ was some extreme overboard bullshit. 

Danny squints at the air, holy shit, wait is Misery Vex actually _Deirdre-Primrose_??? Goddamnit, ghosts and their nicknames; not that he wasn’t just as bad for giving them. 

Oberon crosses his arms, “besides those frost-lovers never followed traditions anyhow and certainly didn’t know how to dress themselves well”. Danny blinks at him, wondering if the man is gonna realise he just described Phantom to a fucking T. Titania giggling into her hand and glancing from him to Oberon tells Danny that she definitely noticed. And Oberon, picking up on the silence, opens his eyes and blinks a bunch; Danny stares at him judgingly but humoured. 

After a bit Oberon goes comically wide-eyed, looks truly dismayed, and practically flings himself at Danny. Halfway laying on him and hugging him around the neck, sounding whiney, “no not you! No nothing like you! Forgive meeeeeee!”. Danny sits upright and pushes him off at the same time, “oh as if I’d be offended by something so weak”, and snickers at the king’s expense; who just whines more. 

Titania sighs into her hand, “do forgive my lummox of a husband”; making Danny snicker more. Oberon just lays on the ground pouting. She puts down her empty cup and smooths her dress, “though his ill-worded musings aren’t incorrect”, looking almost seriously to Danny and frowning slightly, “it truly pains me to say but the lands there grow so cold only the hardiest of my branches can reach, and their lands are so sparse”, shaking her head, “they cover themselves in hides over fabrics and plants”, sighing softly, “they are my children still, as disconnected as they may be. And they are the season of the time of Yules Truce. Yet much must change to absolve them of their disgrace”, side-eyeing Danny, “and hearing of this... recent act, against the High Throne no less”, shaking her head, “I do apologise for _that one's_ actions”.

Danny waves her off, “no worries, different timeline”, both royals pause and blink at him, so he continues, “I didn’t even have a half-brother”. They keep staring at him, “his timeline got obliterated so he got smushed into this one. So she hasn’t actually done anything in this one”, shrugging, “I just wanted to know who this mystery human abducting ghost was. Maybe say hi”. 

Titania continues wide-eyed blinking at him while Oberon actually bursts out laughing and starts hitting the ground. Oberon speaking as he sits himself up and calms down some, “you really are a silly one, aren’t you!”. Titania shakes her head slowly with a soft smile, “well I’m glad then”. 

Danny nods, giving a cheery, “yup! I don’t even exist in his timeline”. Oberon laughs some more. Titania actually joining with some giggles, speaking with a hand over her mouth, “oh now how terrible that would be”. Danny knows she actually means that though. 

Regardless Danny stands up and pats off his cape. Looking at the royals, “oh and by the way, obviously half-brother means we only have one parent in common”. Oberon leans forward, obviously eager for any kind of gossip. Danny smirks, “Plasmius is his father”. Oberon actually _squeals_ , while Titania goes wide-eyed again and gives a soft, “oh!”, like she’s completely scandalised.

Danny walks off a bit but stops and looks back to the two, Titania standing up as he does so. “Little nugget of knowledge though? Plasmius _absolutely_ knows-”, smirking, “-don’t think he's figured out who Vex is, but still. Also, the new High Prince has a fairy mark”. Does Danny enjoy being unnecessarily ominous and making random ghosts on edge? Abso-fucking-lutely. Besides, it was a good warning to give. Both of them. Because Vlad was absolutely liable to show up and flip his shit or do something impressively petty or sadistic once he finds out who Vex is. Especially because the man doesn’t exactly like the Fair Folk. While the fairy mark warning was mostly telling Oberon to not be stupid and try to steal the guy’s name or try trapping him in the forests or altering the flow of time around him if he does for whatever reason wander into the FairLands. 

Danny turns away and walks off, Oberon whining dramatically in the background. Titania’s making herself useful at least, showing him the direction he needs to go with little snowdrop flowers.

Danny knows he’s making progress when he’s just suddenly in a winter wonderland. Just snow. _Everywhere_. Looking behind him, snow. The changes between courts was fucking jarring as usual. Danny doesn’t particularly feel like putting up with the sound of crunching snow so he decides to float around on his back till he either runs into something he’s interested in or someone comes looking for him. 

Arguably it should happen, because hello? freaking High King just wandering around your court? Maybe you should go see what’s up. That just might be a good idea. _Especially_ if you’ve never met before. 

He goes maybe five minutes before he hears howling and pauses as three dire wolf fae beasts stalk out of the trees towards him. Okay, sending the Wild Hunt his way seems excessive and less than friendly. Since he doesn’t feel like getting his ass bit he’ll just hangout here and wait for Berchtold to show her face. The Wild Hunt is one part of the Winter Court Danny’s actually vaguely familiar with. Kinda hard not to, especially when many Fair Folk feared it and Berchtold was notorious for taking orders from no one, not even Titania. Danny honestly doubts she’ll even listen to him. Not that he really cares all that much. 

And speak of the devil, Berchtold steps out from the veil of thick falling snow, covered in birch tree bark armour -so that’s where Flynn got his inspiration- and taking long strides on her long gangly legs. Danny rights himself to be floating cross legged slightly above the ground, looking up a the towering ghost with a loose cocky grin. She scowls at him meanly. “You smell of the royals. Their disciples aren’t welcome here”. Wow, Danny’s almost insulted by that. 

Danny snorts, “disciple and knight ain’t the same thing, you know”. She narrows her eyes at him. “And _I’m_ welcome wherever I feel like being”. Is that a challenge? Yes. Explicitly. Her brandishing a bone dagger makes him snicker. Queue sarcasm, “oh yes, I can just _feel_ how well this is going to go for you”. The wolves growl. 

Berchtold smirks meanly and lunges at him, which yeah he saw that coming. Danny quickly uncrosses his legs and floats to the side, avoiding the blade. Putting a hand to her chest and blasting her back into a tree hard enough to rattle said tree and splinter her armour. The wolves lunging at him themselves for attacking their master, Danny just spins in a ball pulsing out a repulsion field and effectively flinging all three far off into the trees with startled yelps. 

Danny floats closer to Berchtold, who’s crouched in the snow now and scowling, letting the smoky flames from his crown flare up some giving his face a more ominous threatening look as he looks down on her slightly, “heh, real talk, this isn’t going to work out for you. So maybe, like, rethink some of your afterlife decisions. I’m here to see-”, using that Vex nickname probably isn’t the best idea here, since it’s likely insulting, “-Primrose-”, putting on a threatening edge, “-And I _will_ get to do that, whether anyone wants that or not”. She narrows her eyes at him again but does the smart thing and lowers the knife. 

Now Danny’s not a fool, he knows there is precisely zero chance of Berchtold here taking him to her princess. So he chuckles mischievously, pats her head quickly -which she tries to swipe at him for- and zips off into the falling snow; quickly fading out of sight of the aggressive Fair. He’ll have to be smart and avoid her wolves from here on out though. He also has no doubt she’ll communicate with Vex/Primrose to avoid him purely out of spite. But well, finding ghosts is practically one of Danny’s specialties. Sure his ghost sense is a lot less useful in the Zone but still. 

The first Fair he runs into appears to be a child though, who promptly launches herself at him. She’s also butt naked, so that’s slightly awkward. Regardless she giggles as she wraps her arms around his neck and dangles down, “Lord Phantom!”, her giggling more and swinging her legs up to grab his shoulders and practically crawling onto his back/head and grabbing at his hair, “so white!”. Danny chuckles at that, makes sense since she’s just as pale as Berchtold was. Borderline pure white skin is probably common here. Which might earn Danny some points since his ghostly skin is more pale than tan these days. 

She flops down on her butt in the snow, grinning all the while, “I’m Nettle by the way!”, tilting her head, “you looking for Primmy?”. Danny chuckles at that but nods, “yup. You feel like helping a guy out?”. She snickers at him and shakes her head rapidly, “nope! Hide and chase is funner!”, grinning cheekily while standing up and leaning towards him with a finger over her lips, “I’ll tell you she is close though”, and giggles more before running off into the trees. Danny’s not particularly surprised when a snowball pelts him in the shoulder from the same direction; leaving him shaking his head with a chuckle. Elle would probably like her. 

Opting to float up into the trees and wind around the many branches, the whole spider legs thing would probably be pretty good at climbing shit. Danny decides to have some fun with this and gives singsong, ‘where o where could you be?’s as he looks around and comically puts his hand over his eyebrows while scanning areas. 

Pariah would probably just start bombing the place or beset a horde of skeletons down. Being goofy might win Danny some points. 

Danny, with his typical luck, winds up going face-first into invisible sticky... something? Managing to yoink some in front of his face and watching light slightly glint off it makes it clear it’s some kind of thread or silk; spider silk maybe? Hopefully. And arguably he could just change human and phase through this, so it’s not like he’s really in a _sticky situation_. He’ll leave that idea benched for now and instead cranes his head around, smirking a bit when he catches a glimpse of what he’s going to assume is a nearly see-through white spider leg gently land on a tree trunk higher up; kinda looked like there was a dark purple glow inside the probable limb but it was hard to be sure. Taking the chance of either being right or making himself look like an idiot, “why hello there”. 

He just grins and isn’t even slightly startled when a pale vaguely purple face framed by braided black hair comes down out of the blanket of falling snow. Her squinting her multiple black eyes at him appraisingly, “shouldn’t you be more concerned with your... predicament”, grinning slightly meanly, “I like a man who struggles”. 

Danny chuckles, “eh I’ve been in worse”, smirking, “and I could get out of this easily”.

“Oh could you now? How about a little game then, for each minute longer it takes you I’ll make my little threads-”, plucking one of said threads in a menacing manner, “-tighter”. Alright, Danny is officially finding this just slightly creepy. He has a feeling this lady has a sadistic streak. Deciding to be a cheeky bastard, “leave me outta whatever kind of foreplay this is”, and promptly lets his rings wash over him, allowing him to easily phase out of the ‘trap’. Chuckling and waving from the snow, “though you’re welcome to try”. She looks more than a little miffed. 

He stands up and brushes snow off himself as she jumps down from the trees, the spider legs barely making dents in the snow. Danny watching the purple and white switching places, making her lower spider half look purple with a faint white glow inside; her human half is a more pale purple now though. Huh, camouflage. Neat. Striking purple would kinda stand out in lands of white snow and barren trees. 

This also gives him a chance to more genuinely look her over. He’s not surprised by the wendigo pelt draped over her spider abdomen and tied to her waist with intricate silk web knot-work. The black with a green sheen shinebettle clothing leaves _very little_ to the imagination though; but at least it looks like hard armour, not skin-tight latex. Each piece of the shinebettle is shaped like little leaves, some even dangling/trailing off. The stiff waist-length cape with a high collar made of ice is actually pretty pretty though. Then there’s the circlet crown made of entwined birch, holly, and mistletoe that also has bits of birch coming off it kind of like spider legs actually. No fauchard though... maybe she left it in her den? It’s not like that would do much of anything to Phantom after all. 

She huffs in disappointment, putting a clawed hand to her cheek, “aw you’re no fun, we could have gotten to know each other”. Yeah Danny could see how she could wind up seducing some human. She sighs softly, “I gather you’re Phantom, dearie?”.

Danny smirks, “what gave it away? Was it the crown or my devilish charm?”. That gets him a giggle and crinkled eyes. Even if Danny knows damn well that he is less ‘charming’ and more ‘ungodly infuriating’ to most folks. Human and ghost alike. Electing to change back ghosts, because you know, ghostly royal meetings should be done as a ghost. Logic says anyway. She watches very curiously this time. 

Her speaking up as Danny floats out of the impression in the snow he made by falling into it. “Quite the ability you lucked upon. It is quite-”, licking her lips, “- _desirable_ ”. Danny refuses to react to that. Him chuckling instead, “any halfa worth their ectoplasm can do the same”. 

“Ah so that little morsel of gossip is true then. You’re half-mortal”. 

Danny nods with a shrug, “eh it’s no biggie. Been a while since I’ve run into someone who didn’t know that fact was, in fact, a fact”, and grins cheekily. He feels like she’s rolling her eyes at him, kinda hard to tell when they’re solid black. And he’s not even going to try to guess if she’s rolling all of them or just a pair. 

“‘No biggie’, my aren’t you a humble one”, and giggles, probably at his expense. She also clearly doesn’t actually believe Phantom is ‘humble’ for one second. Which yeah, Danny wouldn’t call himself humble either. Her leaning her upper half down toward him some and crinkling her eyes, “now tell me, what brings the fabled ‘savour’ down from his high throne to grace my court? Especially when he’s already graced the others yet left mine by the wayside”, scowling aggressively, “like the melted fools that are unfortunately the rest of my kind”. Oh shit, looks like he might have already earned himself a place in her black book. 

Danny sticks up a finger, “to be fair-”. Earning him some displeased squinting. “-I’ve only visited the Summer Court and Tír na nÓg. I’m rarely even _in_ this Realm”. She hums at him and pats his head, “hush, you’re a child still. I certainly couldn’t expect you to know better”. Danny is almost insulted, damn his young age but just shrugs as nonchalantly as possible, “yeah well, I also heard why those two told me nearly jack all about this court. Which, in my opinion, is pretty bullshit of a reason. Most of my lovers have been human, so”. 

“Oh my, aren’t you a naughty one. I’m surprised they even talk to you”, and she seems just slightly miffed again. Danny snorts, “I’m High King, that would arguably be really stupid of them”. She shakes her head at him like he’s too innocent to understand and promptly snags him under the cape with a leg. He just chooses to dangle there and let her plop him on her spider abdomen. She doesn’t seem like she’s going to be attacking him any time soon, so he crosses his legs and effectively ‘rides’ her as she starts walking/crawling off through the trees. At least the wendigo hide is fluffy and comfy. 

Him resting his chin in a palm, “so... what was he like?”. 

She hums, “hair the colour of a raven, skin as white as snow, and cheeks as red as holly berry. He was a dear. Warrior and bard”, smirking, “knew how to squirm and beg”. Danny is ignoring the second half of that comment, “and here I expected a red-head or maybe a blonde”. Danny’s also not thinking about how his human form pretty closely matched the description of her old lover. 

“Oh he would have made a wonderful red-head! But alas-”, sighing longingly, “-‘twas not to be. And I hardly care what the others may think of me for it. Though I hear you’re something of a warrior yourself”. Danny chuckles, “I don’t generally give a shit what others think of me either. And if by warrior you mean having a lot of knighthood titles and generally beating the shit out of a lot of different ghosties, then yes”. She giggles at that while he continues, “but anyways, I take it it wouldn’t be unthinkable that you’d snatch away a red-head human child? In another time or place perhaps”. She looks over her shoulder at him, “my court has plenty changelings, if that’s what you’re asking, young King”. 

Danny snorts, “eh you’re about right. I’m more curious if, say, a mortal were to create a portal to here and a red-headed human child were to poke their head through, would you snatch them away?”. 

“Well that’s specific. I can assure you no thing has happened”, humming a bit, “now given that circumstances, I fancy I would. Not out of ill-intent, no. Red-heads are quite precious, and children quite sweet”, shaking her head, “whoever let a little one peek in through an unknown portal truly must not take care of them as they should”, tapping a claw on her chin, “I imagine I’d let them flee from me”, looking back at Danny and crinkling her eyes, “most mortals get quite weak in the knees, and not in the way I’d like, at the sight of a spider”.

Danny’s not going to argue that. His mom, Sam and Jazz were probably the only full mortals he knew that wouldn’t even be phased by spotting a spider. He has to ask though, “why would you let them flee? You went to the effort to snatch them”. 

She smirks, “so I could watch them struggle and fail, of course”, giving an innocent but almost creepy smile, “then take them back into my gentle claws to nurse them back to health. Oh the hyper reliance that would foster would be simply _delectable_. To see me as their new mother and one day lover”, sighing longingly, “they’d fight for me one day and kneel begging underfoot the next; pinned down like juicy prey”. 

Danny’s deciding to interrupt this, because eugh. “Getting creepy”. 

She rolls her eyes at him and turns her head to look back forwards, “hmpf. Now of course I’d do away with their old memories, wouldn’t want them running off to some undeserving mortals”. Danny can feel the malicious grin in her words, “alternatively, I’d do it to hurt the hearts of the humans that dared open a portal near my lands. For the loss of a child breaks even the strongest of hearts. It dooms love. Much like my own love was doomed. I would take pleasure from their pain, and maybe one day march the then grown child before them. To see child slaughter parents all for my love. They would smile at me as I ask them how they feel and they’d say ‘I did it for you, so I felt nothing at all’. I’d caress and whisper in the parents' ears about how beautiful their little baby is, how sweet they are. Aren’t they so sweet?”. She trails off humming and chittering, while Danny is more than mildly unnerved. 

Danny blinks at the back of her head, “you are very sadistic”. She giggles at that, “oh I’m nothing but a sweetheart”. Danny rolls his eyes almost painfully. Which she ignores, “and you sound like one who likes the pain of it all. Little Suffered King”. 

Danny chokes slightly and shakes his head rapidly, “no! I’m just aggressively confrontational and have some really terrible luck. I don’t _want_ to get injured, Ancients”. She giggles at him and clearly doesn’t believe him; which Danny thinks is some bullshit. 

She speaks as if this little sidetrack in the conversation never happened, “I’d have my other reasons though”. Gaining Danny’s attention again as she gestures her hands around the snow-covered forest, “my lands grow only colder and sparser. Red-heads, wild with magic, and humans, so filled with life blood. Here one like that could revitalise the land, or so I believe. Red like holly berry and winterberry; may they ripen evermore. Delicate and attractive, yet a poison to the tongue”. 

Danny blinks, that actually made some sense and was less vain/creepy. Also explained snatching human children being apparently common in this court. Based on the barren trees though, he doesn’t think it’s exactly been... effective. Ghosts get stuck in their ways though, so no point arguing her logic there. Instead choosing to get things back on track regarding Flynn, “yeah well, this particular human wouldn’t be and wasn’t very helpful in that regard. Guy successfully lived nomadically on his own for fourteen years before he got tossed into this timeline”. She laughs loudly at that, “survived on his own. Oh now that’s just precious”. Danny isn’t sure if that means she doesn’t believe him so he opens up his phone from out of his magic pockets and flips to a photo he managed to snap of Flynn under the crag where he found him; showing it to her. 

“Well I’ll be”, her giggling, “looks like a grown warrior. Little rough around the edges, but I’m sure I could freshen him up”. Making Danny pinch the bridge of his nose. Jesus fucking Christ. “He is also my half-brother, the son of Plasmius, and officially High Prince; and will be _left alone_. Oh my god”. 

She giggles as they enter a clearing, Danny only now noticing the tall icy pillars that seemed to reflect and refract multicoloured light. Him glancing around and spotting the occasional pale Fair Folk head peeking out at them. Primrose plucks him off her by the cape, setting him down on the ground while leaning her face down towards his, “that only makes him more appetising, dearie”. Danny doesn’t know what to do with that. 

“Uhh, his name’s Flynn by the way”. 

She nods curtly, “then I shall call him Flint”. 

“You can’t just rename him!”.

She smirks and sticks her nose up in the air, “can’t I?”.

“ _No_!”. Though Danny has the distinct feeling that Flynn won’t actually care. 

Danny elects to walk with her through the Court square, waving at the occasional Fair Folk that eyes him. Eventually asking, “how old are you anyway?”.

She giggles and puts a few fingers over her mouth, “don’t you know it’s shameful to ask a lady such things”, clearly grinning, “maybe I should punish you accordingly”. Making Danny mumble, “forget I asked”. Which she only giggles more at, “I predate Oberon. Hence why that fool couldn’t do away with me”, and nods smugly. 

“I would be impressed by that if ClockWork wasn’t someone I hang with regularly”. She huffs disappointedly at that. Danny is actually a bit impressed though. Impressed that she’s one of the old Ancients, he had been kinda expecting her to be on the younger end. 

Shaking his head as they wander into what Danny’s going to assume is her den, considering it looked far more grand and intricate, “‘nother question. Why did the others give you the name Misery Vex? That’s the name Flynn knew you under”. 

She huffs and scowls at him, “now that I must see corrected. Hmpf”, shaking her head, “they called me such because they see me a curse of misery that befalls any who dare love the living. Cursed forever with a heart of ice”. 

Danny grunts, “that’s stupid”. Resulting in her patting his head again, “well aren’t you sweet”. Then sighing as she straightens up, “though it is not untrue. I have yet to find love since”. Danny shakes his head, “if you surrender hope, then love was right to leave you”.

She pauses and blinks at him, shaking her head faintly, “you might be a king yet”. Which Danny blushes slightly at, choosing to look over the ‘decorations’ instead of respond. 

He does kinda get Titania’s annoyance, it was mostly bones, hide, and other animal bits rather than plants and flowers. There was some bark stuff though. Shaking his head at portrait painted on oxen hide, “I’ve got a lot of nicknames myself”, and chuckles. Listing off on his fingers, while Primrose slowly raises her eyebrow more and more, “The Great One, Thorn Prince, Hoarfrost Prince, Prince Of Times Edge, Guardian Of The Veil, KingsBane, Prince Of The Dragons Heart, Fright’s Keeper, Realms Hammer, The True Ambassador. And so on”.

Her speaking in a slightly condescending tone, “well aren’t you accomplished”. Danny rolls his eyes, and mutters, “I didn’t ask for them, I just stumble ass over elbows into problems constantly”. Earning him some snickers while she wanders off, using the spider legs to easily navigate around. 

He opts to just wander around aimlessly and fiddle with things, kinda surprised she just left him to his own devices. He’s honestly not sure if Flynn would have liked living here, sure seems comfier than sleeping on rocks and whatnot though. Not that that’s particularly difficult to achieve. Least it seems Primrose would have actually taken care of him... kinda. Better than most ghosts at least. He’s also decided that she is not going to be joining Vlad and the Observants on Danny’s personal shit list. Now he just has to figure out if having her and Flynn meet would be a good idea. Flynn apparently didn’t care much and Primrose was at least verbally in favour of it. Meeting Jack and Maddie would be a bad idea though, considering the ghost hate. And Vlad would probably try to ‘have words’ or attack her; also bad idea. Vlad didn’t have the royal leg up like Danny did, not that the nutcase cared, but also this her hasn’t actually done _anything_ and is... not horrible. Maybe he could just teleport her to his room and drag Flynn through the wall, have a quick little meetup and then send everyone on their way. 

Danny doesn’t care what Flynn says, the guy’s got to want at least some kind of closure about being freaking kidnapped! Maybe know what would have been if he hadn’t been able to genuinely get by on his own. 

Regardless he’s out of mental debating time as Primrose crawls back in, carrying a few things. Her promptly jumping down to him and effectively pushing the stuff at him, “spruce branches bound with red cord, for him to find his way home. A shell filled with lullaby song and the warmth of campfire in the coldest of winter. An adder stone eroded by soft snow, to see us where we may be. Reindeer pelt. And runeberry whine”, winking at him, “it’s an aphrodisiac”. Danny blinks down at the stuff while she grabs something else and shoves it at him, “now for you, I know my manners. Bedroot champagne and ciderbloom twinned thrice to discourage that bad luck of yours. And a frosted opal dagger, to make a man of you”, and smirks meanly. Danny rolls his eyes but chuckles a little as he puts the stuff in his magic pockets, “you are most kind”; her nodding with a huff. 

Looking back up to her when she starts up again, “and one more thing”, Primrose quickly cups Danny’s face and kisses his forehead. Grinning soft sickly sweet down at him while he blinks in confusion, “there, now you bare the touch of my arcane kiss”. If Danny wasn’t who he was and familiar with ghosts, he’d think she just cursed him or something. He won’t be too surprised though if he finds sudden and seemingly random inspiration in the near future. 

Danny chooses to fix his hair over acknowledging that, “you know you already gave Flynn something, in the form of a fairy mark. Since I doubt anyone else would have given him one”. She puts her hand over her mouth and crinkles her eyes, speaking with a small smile, “oh! Well I only do that for my sweet children”. Danny pauses at that, great other-timeline-her made herself Flynn’s Standing Guardian. Effectively adopted him. Well that makes things a smidge more complicated, but also less. Because now they kinda have to meet. She also clearly knows this, as she walks behind him and crawls her fingers down the side of his face, speaking sickly sweet again, “surely you won’t deny us meet”. 

Danny can’t help the awkward chuckle this time while manoeuvring out of her grasp, “I doubt I could truly keep you. I know FrostBite, Pandora, and ClockWork certainly wouldn’t let anyone keep them from me”. 

“Oh but you’re king. You’re not just _anyone_ , dearie”.

Danny rolls his eyes, “but I’m also not a dick”. Earning him a light laugh from her, “then do lead the way, King-Not-A-Dick”; Danny hopes that doesn’t become a new nickname. Ancients. This time she is absolutely laughing _at_ , not _with_ , him. “Oh Brother To Flint And Frost”. Okay that’s definitely going to wind up a nickname. 

Danny shakes his head with a sigh, “his name’s still Flynn”.

“Hmpf”. Then promptly startles him just slightly by flicking on her glamour, he kinda figured she wasn’t the type who could be bothered to do that. At least when she knows that the human she’s going to be around is whole ass aware she’s a freaking ghost. Seemed pointless but whatever. Now she’s long-limbed and tall; pale-skinned and black-eyed. Her clothing is effectively the same except the wendigo pelt hangs off her waist and a spider silk skirt comes down off the shinebettle armour on her chest; white and shimmering like it was coated in frost. Her hair a long ebony black with a purple tint and moves freely around her waist. She isn’t wearing shoes though, which Danny almost laughs at. 

Shaking his head at her humorously before sticking his hand out to make a portal. Though he holds up a finger to pause her so he can stick his head through and warn the guy. 

“Hey so uh-”. Danny isn’t exactly surprised to get cut off and have to pull his head back through as Flynn flings the ice blade at his face. Danny eyeing the ice blade as it imbeds itself into the icy floor before looking to Primrose, “he can be a little trigger happy”. She just giggles. Danny opts to chuck the blade back through before sticking his head through again. 

“You done?”. 

Flynn, in typical fashion, just grunts at him. 

“So you know how we discovered your little fairy mark? Yeah yeah, turns out that was part of her making herself your Standing Guardian. So congrats! You’ve got a ghost parent!”, tilting his head and thinking of Vlad, “two ghost parents!”. Primrose takes that moment to _walk on his back_ to get through the portal. Nearly making Danny face-plant while launching herself at Flynn; hugging him around the neck. 

She practically coos at him and runs one set of fingers -that still had very pointy nails, Danny notes. Possibly her glamours flaw?- over the guy’s cheek, “Oh now aren’t you just like a berry. Ripe and red and ready to eat”. Flynn looks more than a little confused and unsure what to do.

Danny walks fully through the portal while facepalming. Though he mouths ‘glamour’ at the guy to at least clear up one thing he might be confused about. Danny’s blaming the house's alarms not going off on her glamour, seeing as Oberon has literally sat in his living room before. And Danny had coded the house not to go off when it senses him, or Vlad for that matter. 

The two just stare at each other for a bit, making Danny feel extremely uncomfortable; her giggling after a while doesn’t help. Fuck this was a bad idea. But at least he figures out why _Flynn_ is starting when he finally speaks up, “yer familiar. Yer feel an smell”. Well damn, Danny’s not sure how he remembers her after _fourteen fucking years_. But eh, the Fair are memorable like that, he guesses. Well okay, the fairy mark might smell/feel like her. 

She still hasn’t let go of Flynn’s neck and grins, “do you find it alluring?”. Danny turns around and bangs his head against the wall. She looks back towards Danny and giggles at him for that. 

She finally lets go of the guy's neck as Plasmius floats aggressively through the outer wall looking ready to rumble. Meaning Danny now has to go into damage control mode. Because _of course_ the frootloop put some kind of far more sensitive ghost sensor in the shit he gave Flynn (obviously set to ignore Danny, but still). 

Danny quickly floating over to put his hand, rather forcefully might he add, on Vlad’s ghostly chest. “Now I know what this looks like but, and hear me out, meet your new ghost wife”, sticking up a finger as Vlad goes from looking aggressive to annoyedly confused, “also, know that was a joke. And that while I am and am being a dumbass, this whole situation going on here was -probably. Hopefully- not a dumb decision”. 

Vlad glares at him, “you truly know how to inspire my confidence, Daniel”. Ooooh Danny can _feel and taste t_ he sarcasm there. 

Primrose decides to speak up and grain Vlad’s attention, “ahh and so comes one of the whispered makers of this little snowdrop”, and gives a very stiff-looking Flynn a pat on the cheek. Which Vlad nearly snarls at her for and squints while clearly looking her over. Practically hissing, “Misery Vex I take it”. 

She pouts at him yet speaks with noticeably bared teeth, “that’s Deirdre-Primrose to you. Foolish man, one whose struck down your common sense to prey upon it”. Vlad’s scowl deepens.

While Vlad goes about trying to be the ‘dominant’ one in this situation by getting all up in Primrose’s face, Flynn silently makes his way over to Danny, “this ain’t goin’ well”. 

“No shit Sherlock”. Explaining at Flynn’s confused look, “nother saying, not important”. 

Meanwhile, the two adult ghosts go at it:

“Oh as if you have any _real_ claim over Flint”. 

“His name is Flynn”.

“I’ll call him whatever I please”. 

“Like Hell I’ll let you, woman”.

“Oh as if you could stop me. I encourage you to try. I bet you’d look much better bound and gagged”. 

Danny snickers to himself as that throws Vlad off his game slightly. “... you’re not even welcome here”.

She giggles at him, “I’m queen of winter's breath, I’m welcome wherever my breeze blows. And I can make any spine tingle just as easily, not that I’d let one of your sort experience such pleasures”. Danny takes that as a sign that he _will not_ have to suffer through her flirting with Vlad. Good, because he might actually gag and throw up otherwise. 

Still Danny should put a stop to this, before it gets weird or gets any... unwanted attention. Floating forward, “guys, cool your tits, before you wake my folks and they barge in here. Which would be, you know, _bad_. Especially considering only half of us look human and one of the ones who does is a complete stranger to them”. Flynn points at Danny and nods, probably easily able to tell how much of a shit show that would turn into. 

Primrose sticks her nose up in the air, crossing her arms as she looks away from Vlad with a, “hmpf”. Vlad just throws her another scowl before squinting at Danny, “... _why_ are you wearing that around your throat, boy”.

“Because it’s _fashionable_ not that you know anything about that”. 

Flynn whacks Danny over the head with his hand. Resulting in Danny putting his hands over his head and sounding a bit petulant, “hey! What was that for!”. Flynn grunting at him, “yer suppose be peace makin’”. Which Danny grumbles incoherently over. 

Vlad sneers, “what peace is there to be made”, glaring at Primrose, “she shouldn’t be here”, and switches his glare to Danny. 

Danny rolls his eyes exaggeratedly and crosses his arms, “hey, we talked. She likely only snatched him because _someone_ wasn’t a very good parent and left a child unattended to stick his head through an open ghost portal”, shrugging, “and the red-head thing only encouraged her more, but come on Vladdie. It was you, mom, or both of you being negligent that led to this. So really, who’s to blame?”, glancing to Primrose and hoping he won’t regret this, “she’s a perfectly nice, if a bit strange, lady”, looking back to Vlad, “also, consider, Oberon and Titania _combined_ couldn’t solidly beat her ass”. 

Primrose grins sweetly -yeah Danny’s going to regret complimenting her in at least one way- and crinkles her eyes, “my aren’t you so sweet, dearie. If you were older I’d gobble you up without sparing a bite”. 

“Uh. I think I’ll pass”.

She just giggles at him. She then proceeds to effectively ignore Vlad’s entire existence and walks up to Flynn. Danny opting to float over to Vlad to hold the man back, “I know you’re possessive, but Ancients man, _chill_. I’m a dumbass but I’m not _that dumb_ , to literally guide someone who would actually hurt my freaking brother in here. Though your sadistic side has freaking _nothing_ on hers. So seriously”, glaring at him, “ **cool it** ”. Vlad scowls but at least he listens. 

She hums as she pats Flynn’s head, “my do you ever need a bath”, sticking her hand behind her as birch branches bend and jerk out of the portal, handing her a bottle. She taps said bottle lightly into Flynn’s shirt with a smirk, “oatmeal and milk, with dried lavender and rose petals”, winking, “and just a hint of eucalyptus. Should clean you right up, you dirty man”. 

Making Danny sigh, looking to Vlad, “the most harmful thing she might do is seduce him”. 

“You’re joking”.

“I wish. Ancients I wish”.

Flynn very clearly doesn’t know what to do with this as he kinda just stands there as she cups his face and gives him a forehead kiss (Danny had had a slight internal panic attack that she was going to _kiss_ kiss him). Her whispering into Flynn’s forehead, “remember, you will always have a home. You know the scents. You know the songs. Wherever may you chose to roam. Though I pray you come back to me, from time to time”, grinning, “I’ll be waiting”, and pulls back from him. Her nodding curtly at him, still cupping his face, “there. Now you’ve got a little touch of love too”. 

Danny ignores Vlad quirking an eyebrow at him. 

Primrose gives Flynn’s cheek one final pat before relinquishing her hold on his face and walking gracefully over to Danny/the portal. Her very quickly fingering his chin, which he leans away from promptly. Earning giggles from her, “do be a dear and visit once and a while, sweet little king. Ta ta”, and walks through the portal; Danny immediately closing it behind her. 

Everyone just kinda stands/floats in silence for a bit. Before Danny remembers the shit filling his pockets, walking over while fishing in his magic pockets, handing it over with an awkward chuckle, “she, ah, also gave me gifts to give you. Why she didn’t just do that herself I don’t know. Might have something to do with deciding to visit after she had already passed them off to me, but whatever”. 

Flynn just puts the stuff on his little dresser, though he does eye the dagger approvingly. “She seems... nice?”.

Danny shrugs, “yeah I don’t know either, man. As far as ghost interactions go for me, that was pretty up there on the weird scale”. 

Vlad just grunts and leans against the wall, making Danny look to and sigh at him, “you’re not going home, are you”. Vlad glares at him, the obvious ‘no’ is obvious. Making Danny shake his head, “well I’m going to bed. Because floating here watching you watch him while pretending to not be watching him, would be awkward as Hell; and I’ve had enough awkward for one day. Possibly for one weak”. Looking to Flynn, “night night, don’t let the Vlad bite”. Earning the satisfactory annoyed reply of, “I do not bite people, you child”. Flynn just looks confused, Danny should stop messing with the poor guy’s brain, “it’s a play on a common saying. ‘Don’t let the bed bugs bite’. But eh, Vlad’s parasitic enough to count”, and phases quickly through the wall to his bedroom, avoiding a small pink ecto-blast from Vlad. 


End file.
